LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 

GIFT  OF 
THE   FAMILY  OF   REV.   DR.  GEORGE   MOOAR 

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EZRA    ABBOT 

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t>e  sball  fcnoto  t&e  tttttl),  anfc  tl)e  tvtttl)  gfjall  matie  pott  free " 


THE 
^  UNIVERSITY  } 

r  OF 

"fcik'fORNVL 


PUBLISHED   FOR  THE  ALUMNI   OF 

THE    HARVARD    DIVINITY     SCHOOL 
CAMBRIDGE 


CONTENTS. 


PREFACE     5 

BIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE      7 

• 

ADDRESS  BY  PROFESSOR  C.  C.  EVERETT,  D.D 9 

ADDRESS  BY  REV.  AUGUSTUS  WOODBURY 16 

ADDRESS  BY  REV.  A.  P.  PEABODY 19 

ADDRESS  BY  PROFESSOR  JOSEPH  HENRY  THAYER,  D.D.     ...  28 
MEMORIAL  TRIBUTES  : 

FROM  ACADEMICAL  AND  LITERARY  BODIES 61 

FROM  PERSONAL  SOURCES 64 

LIST  OF  HIS  PUBLICATIONS 69 

CORRECTION 74 


JLOl 


PREFACE. 


BY  a  vote  of  the  officers  and  Business  Committee  of  the  Alumni 
Association  of  the  Harvard  Divinity  School,  it  was  resolved  that, 
in  place  of  the  usual  address  at  the  annual  meeting  of  the  Associa- 
tion, a  service  should  be  held  in  memory  of  the  late  EZRA  ABBOT, 
Bussey  Professor  of  New  Testament  Criticism  and  Interpretation 
in  the  Divinity  School  of  Harvard  University.  The  service  thus 
arranged  was  held  June  24,  1884,  in  the  First  Parish  Church, 
Cambridge.  It  consisted  of  devotional  exercises,  an  introductory 
address  by  the  President  of  the  Alumni  Association,  the  Rev. 
Augustus  Woodbury,  and  addresses  by  the  Rev.  A.  P.  Peabody, 
D.D.,  and  Professor  J.  Henry  Thayer,  D.D.  At  the  conclusion 
of  the  service,  it  was  unanimously  voted  by  the  Alumni  that  the 
Faculty  be  requested,  to  print  the  memorial  addresses  delivered 
on  that  day.  By  a  subsequent  vote  of  the  officers  of  the  Associa- 
tion, Professor  C.  C.  Everett,  D.D.,  was  requested  to  permit  his 
address,  delivered  at  the  funeral  of  Dr.  Abbot,  to  be  printed  from 
the  phonographic  report. 

In  accordance  with  these  resolutions  of  the  Alumni,  the  ad- 
dresses mentioned  have  been  gathered  and  arranged  in  the  order 
of  their  delivery.  Owing  to  lack  of  time,  Professor  Thayer  was 
obliged  to  omit  portions  of  his  essay  at  the  memorial  service.  It 
is  here  printed  in  full.  A  list  of  Dr.  Abbot's  publications,  so  far 
as  they  are  known,  has  been  added,  with  various  resolutions  of 
academic  and  literary  bodies  and  a  few  tributes  from  personal 
sources.  The  heliotype,  made  from  a  faithful  likeness  by  William 
Aitken  of  Boston,  will  be  to  many  a  grateful  feature  of  the  book. 

This  sheaf  of  kindly  tributes  is  offered  by  the  Alumni,  through 
the  co-operation  of  the  Faculty,  as  a  befitting  memorial  of  a  rare 


and  much  loved  teacher.  It  is  gratifying  to  know  that  —  by  the 
kindness  of  Mrs.  Abbot,  who  has  generously  given  the  large  and 
valuable  library  of  her  husband  to  the  Divinity  School  —  future 
students  are  to  enjoy  another  memorial  of  Dr.  Abbot  which  shall 
be  a  perpetual  reminder  of  the  ties  which  bound  him  to  that 
institution.  In  recording  this  ample  and  welcome  gift,  the  Secre- 
tary feels  that  he  does  not  transcend  the  duties  of  his  office  in 
expressing  the  gratitude  with  which  the  Alumni  will  receive  the 
announcement. 

S.  J.  BARROWS, 

Secretary   of  the  Alumni  Association 
of  the  Harvard  Divinity  School. 


EZRA  ABBOT,  eldest  child  of  Ezra  and  Phebe  (Abbot) 
Abbot,  was  born  in  Jackson,  Waldo  County,  Maine,  April 
28,  1819;  was  fitted  for  college  at  Phillips  (Exeter)  Acad- 
emy; graduated  at  Bowdoin  College  in  1840,  and  received 
its  degree  of  A.M.  in  1843  ;  removed  to  Cambridge  in  1847 ; 
after  some  time  spent  in  teaching,  in  pursuing  private  stud- 
ies, and  in  rendering  service  in  the  libraries  of  Harvard 
College  and  the  Boston  Athenaeum,  was  appointed  in  1856 
Assistant  Librarian  of  Harvard  College;  and  in  1872 
Bussey  Professor  of  New  Testament  Criticism  and  Inter- 
pretation in  the  Divinity  School. 

He  was  elected  in  1852  a  member  of  the  American  Ori- 
ental Society,  and  from  1853  its  Recording  Secretary;  in 
1861,  a  member  of  the  American  Academy  of  Arts  and 
Sciences;  in  1871  appointed  University  Lecturer  on  the 
Textual  Criticism  of  the  New  Testament  ;  in  the  same 
year  chosen  a  member  of  the  New  Testament  Company 
for  the  revision  of  our  English  Bible.  He  was  also  a 
member  of  the  Society  of  Biblical  Literature  and  Exegesis, 
and  of  the  Harvard  Biblical  Club. 

In  1 86 1,  he  received  from  Harvard  College  the  honorary 
degree  of  A.M.  ;  in  1869  that  of  LL.D.  from  Yale  College, 
and  the  same  from  Bowdoin  College  in  1878  ;  in  1872  from 
Harvard  College  that  of  S.T.D. ;  and  he  was  tendered  the 
degree  of  D.D.  by  the  University  of  Edinburgh  at  its  recent 
tercentenary,  but  passed  away  before  the  date  of  the  cele- 
bration. 

He  died  at  his  home  in  Cambridge  at  5.30  P.M.,  on 
Friday,  March  21,  1884. 


SERVICE    AT    APPLETON    CHAPEL. 


ADDRESS.* 

BY    PROF.    C.    C.    EVERETT,    D.D. 

WE  may  realize  the  fact  of  our  bereavement,  as  we  gather 
to  speak  and  hear  words  of  eulogy  of  one  whose  loving 
presence  would  have  made  such  words  impossible.  I  shall 
strive  to  moderate  my  words  by  the  thought  of  his  shrink- 
ing modesty,  and,  so  far  as  possible,  make  them  such  as 
would  not  offend  his  ear. 

It  is  pleasant  to  go  back  to  the  boyhood  of  Ezra  Abbot, 
and  to  find  even  in  his  childhood  the  elements  which  united 
to  make  up  his  life.  He  was  born  in  a  thinly  populated 
farming  town  in  Maine.  His  mother  died  while  he  was  still 
a  child  :  his  father  lived  a  retired  life,  devoted  to  his  books. 
The  house  stood  in  a  wood  a  little  way  from  the  travelled 
street.  Here,  he  learned  that  love  of  nature  which  followed 
him  through  life.  From  his  father,  doubtless,  he  got  his 
love  of  retirement  and  books ;  and  it  may  be  that  his  mother 
left  him  that  light  gayety  of  spirit  which  marked  him  as  a 
child,  his  buoyant  love  of  the  things  about  him,  of  wander- 
ing in  the  forest  in  the  pursuit  of  the  natural  beauty. 

As  he  grew  in  years,  his  love  of  study  and  his  success  in 
it  became  more  marked.  At  Bowdoin  College,  where  he 
graduated,  he  took  an  honorable  position  as  a  scholar. 
After  that,  he  taught  school  in  Maine.  It  is  a  striking 
coincidence  that  his  partner  in  this  labor  died  a  few  weeks 
ago.  This  work  of  teaching  he  most  heartily  enjoyed. 
Shrinking  and  retiring  by  nature,  he  was  always  fond  of 

*  Delivered  in  Appleton  Chapel,  Cambridge,  at  the  funeral  of  Dr.  Abbot,  March  25,  1884,  and 
phonographically  reported. 


IO 

children  ;  and,  here,  he  had  children  that  were  eager  to  learn, 
and  returned  his  love  with  an  answering  love. 

It  was  about  this  time  that  Andrews  Norton  was  publish- 
ing those  works,  which  marked  an  epoch  in  the  history  of 
Biblical  and  theological  science  in  our  country.  Ezra  Abbot 
was,  as  I  have  said,  shrinking  and  retiring  ;  but  he  was 
always  bold  in  the  matter  of  truth.  He  wrote  a  letter  to 
Andrews  Norton,  expressing  his  delight  in  his  work  on  the 
Trinity,  stating  that  he  had  formed  an  index  of  it,  and,  if 
tradition  is  correct,  taking  issue  with  Prof.  Norton  in  some 
point  of  interpretation.  This  tradition  I  have  not  been  able 
to  verify,  but  I  think  it  has  the  likelihood  of  probability. 
Andrews  Norton  was  delighted  with  the  letter,  and  invited 
the  writer  to  visit  him  ;  and  this  was  the  introduction  of 
Ezra  Abbot  to  Cambridge. 

He  first  took  the  High  School  in  Cambridgeport.  This 
was  probably  the  only  work  in  his  life  that  was  distasteful 
to  him,  but  he  sweetened  it  by  congenial  labor.  He  made  a 
catalogue  of  the  library  of  the  school,  and  the  work  was  so 
perfectly  done  that  it  opened  to  him  a  career  in  what  was  for 
a  time  the  occupation  of  his  life.  It  procured  for  him  an  in- 
troduction to  the  force  of  the  library  of  the  Boston  Athenaeum. 
Afterward,  he  was  transferred  to  an  honorable  position  in 
the  Harvard  College  Library.  He  possessed  many  qualities 
that  fitted  him  for  the  life  of  a  librarian, —  his  patience,  his 
industry,  his  rapidity  of  work,  his  power  of  classification  and 
.arrangement,  his  tenacity  of  memory.  If  his  ideal  was  so 
high  as  to  be  unapproachable,  it  was  nevertheless  an  ideal 
which  brought  inspiration  ;  and  all  the  work  done  toward 
reaching  that  ideal  was  useful  work.  It  was  a  delight  to  him 
that  his  work  was  among  books,  but  still  it  was  not  the  most 
congenial  work.  His  leisure  was  occupied  in  the  study  of 
the  New  Testament,  which,  it  seems,  he  began  in  his  early 
youth.  I  speak  of  his  leisure  :  this  leisure  was  largely  a 
mosaic  made  up  of  moments  which  others  would  have  thrown 
away,  but  it  was  nevertheless  leisure  sufficient  for  his  work. 

But  it  was  doubtless  with  joy  that  he  found  himself  trans- 
ferred to  a  labor  more  congenial,  when  he  accepted  the  chair 


II 


of  the  newly  founded  professorship  of  the  study  of  the  New 
Testament  in  the  Divinity  School  of  Harvard  University. 
Here,  the  great  passion  of  his  life  found  free  scope.  When 
I  think  of  his  devotion  to  the  study  of  the  New  Testament, 
it  reminds  me  of  some  movement  in  a  grand  musical  com- 
position that  at  first  is  faint  and  fitful,  but  which  gains  power 
and  continuity  as  the  work  proceeds,  and  at  last  swells  out 
and  controls  the  whole.  At  last,  he  was  able  to  give  himself 
wholly  to  the  study  of  the  New  Testament.  The  work  of 
teaching  he  always  enjoyed.  He  brought  to  the  students 
profound  learning-  that  won  their  confidence,  accuracy  and 
clearness  of  teaching  that  instructed  their  minds,  and  a 
beauty  of  spirit  that  won  their  love. 

His  work  as  a  teacher  occupied  but  a  small  portion  of  his 
time.  The  rest  was  given  to  independent  study  in  his 
chosen  line  of  work.  Those  familiar  with  the  work  of  the 
Committee  for  the  revision  of  the  translation  of  the  New 
Testament  will  know  what  his  service  was  in  that  direction. 
It  was  in  these  years  that  he  began  to  devote  himself  more 
and  more  to  what  became  the  specialty  of  his  life :  I  mean 
the  study  of  the  textual  criticism  of  the  New  Testament. 
While  his  power  was  recognized  in  all  the  departments  of  his 
chosen  field,  in  this  he  stood,  in  this  country  at  least,  con- 
fessedly without  a  rival.  All  American  scholars  rejoiced  in 
the  lustre  which  his  scholarship  shed  upon  this  country.  As 
he  had  no  equal  here,  it  is  doubtful  if  he  had  a  superior  any- 
where. 

When  I  consider  his  life  thus  devoted  more  and  more 
earnestly,  and  more  and  more  completely,  to  the  object  of 
his  choice,  I  think  that  we  must  pronounce  it  to  have  been 
a  happy  one.  I  know  that  there  are  many  who  feel  that 
indeed  it  might  have  been  a  happy  life ;  but  that  this  life 
among  books  is  happiness  that  is  reserved  for  those  whose 
natures  are  of  such  a  sort  that  they  can  enjoy  no  other ; 
that  there  are  natures,  unlike  the  robust  men  and  women 
about  them,  who  because  they  have  no  other  pleasures  can 
afford  to  live  upon  this  nutriment.  This  was  not  so  with 
Ezra  Abbot.  The  world  opened  to  him  many  inviting  paths. 


12 

Although  he  lived  so  much  alone,  there  were  none  more 
fond  than  he  of  meeting  those  who  were  congenial  to  him, 
none  more  fond  than  he  of  the  sports  of  life.  That  buoyant 
gayety  that  marked  his  childhood  accompanied  him  to  the 
very  closing  days  of  his  life.  I  like  to  think  of  his  eager 
pleasure  upon  the  play-ground,  his  accuracy  of  hand  and  eye, 
equal  to  that  accuracy  of  mind  which  served  him  in  his 
study.  I  like  even  to  recall  his  playful  shout  of  victory  or 
defeat. 

The  love  of  nature  which  he  learned  in  his  forest  home 
never  left  him.  No  poet  watched  with  more  joy  than  he 
for  the  first  opening  of  the  buds  in  the  spring-time.  None 
rejoiced  more  than  he  to  trace  the  wild  flowers  to  their 
secret  home  in  the  forest. 

His  heart  was  not  only  a  gay  and  buoyant  heart,  it  was  a 
loving  heart.  No  one  took  more  joy  in  his  friends  than  he. 
It  was  a  great  thing  for  a  man  to  be  a  friend  of  Ezra  Abbot ; 
for  his  affection  surrounded  him  with  a  halo  that,  coming 
from  such  a  source,  one  was  almost  tempted  to  think  might 
be  real. 

He  was  a  generous  man.  It  was  not  so  much  that  he  was 
generous  with  his  money,  he  was  generous  with  that  which 
scholars  value  more  than  money  :  he  was  generous  with  his 
time.  He  was  generous  with  that  which  many  scholars 
value  more  than  time :  he  was  generous  with  his  work.  It 
mattered  very  little,  apparently,  under  whose  name  his  work 
appeared  or  under  what  form.  His  enthusiasm  was  for  his 
work ;  and,  when  that  was  done,  he  was  satisfied.  If  he  had 
any  special  pride  that  can  be  called  individual,  any  personal 
interest  in  the  triumph  of  his  work,  I  think  it  was  the  suc- 
cess and  triumph  of  American  scholarship.  In  that,  I  think, 
was  his  great  pride  rather  than  in  anything  that  he  had  done. 

He  was  devoted  to  his  duty.  There  was  something  noble 
in  the  manner  in  which  he  felt  his  duty ;  in  the  way  in 
which  his  feeble  form  could  force  itself  to  his  accustomed 
place  in  the  lecture  room,  until  his  own  conscience  absolved 
him  from  further  work. 

The  world,  as  I  have  said,  opened  to  him  inviting  paths 


13 

in  many  lines.  If  he  chose  to  devote  himself  to  study,  it 
was  not  because  that  was  his  only  passion  :  it  was  because 
it  was  an  all-absorbing,  conquering  passion, —  not  because 
that  was  all  he  had,  but  because  that  was  what  he  prized 
more  than  anything  else.  And  so  I  repeat  that  we  may 
call  his  life  a  happy  one.  I  do  not  mean  to  unveil  the 
sweet  and  sacred  enjoyments  of  home.  I  do  not  forget  his 
last  years  of  weakness  and  suffering ;  but  still,  in  spite  of 
all,  I  think  we  may  give  to  his  life  that  crown  which  I  have 
named ;  for  it  was  the  absorbing,  the  successful,  the  com- 
plete surrender  of  a  man  to  the  object  of  his  passion. 

The  work  to  which  Mr.  Abbot  devoted  himself  was  one 
which  involved  many  pleasures  of  its  own.  We  need  hardly 
speak  of  the  joy  of  accuracy,  of  the  joy  which  every  intel- 
lectual power  finds  in  its  fulfilment.  There  was  much  in 
the  joy  of  mastery,  especially  in  a  nature  so  modest  as  his 
own.  It  was  very  interesting  to  see  the  hesitation  with 
which  he  would  speak  upon  any  subject,  no  matter  how 
much  he  had  studied  it,  if  it  lay  outside  of  his  chosen  path  ; 
and  to  see  the  confidence  with  which  he  would  speak,  in 
spite  of  any  authority,  concerning  any  subject  which  he  had 
made  his  work.  I  think  we  must  admit  that  he  liked  the 
joy  of  combat.  I  think  he  found  a  joy  in  a  certain  kind  of 
controversy.  I  think  he  liked  to  puncture  conceit ;  but  his 
only  weapon  was  facts,  with,  perhaps,  sometimes  that  deli- 
cate irony  which  he  knew  so  well  how  to  use. 

He  rejoiced  in  the  companionship  which  his  chosen  work 
brought  him,  for  it  brought  him  very  close  to  men  whose 
whole  spirit  as  well  as  whose  whole  occupation  were  in 
sympathy  with  his. 

Biblical  science,  the  science  of  the  New  Testament,  is 
becoming  indeed  a  science.  The  textual  criticism  of  the 
New  Testament  is,  perhaps,  in  a  special  way  scientific  :  even 
the  interpretation  of  the  New  Testament  is  approaching 
this  position.  The  result  of  this  is  that  men  do  not  stand 
within  the  limits  of  their  special  sects,  twisting  texts  of 
Scripture  to  suit  their  special  needs  :  they  work  together 
upon  a  common  foundation  and  toward  a  common  end. 


14 

Thus,  Ezra  Abbot  rejoiced  to  find  himself  working  conge- 
nially with  men  of  the  widest  difference  in  habits  of  thought 
and  belief. 

He  enjoyed  success.  In  spite  of  his  modesty,  he  enjoyed 
recognition.  He  enjoyed  this  recognition  of  his  work, 
when  it  was  from  some  source  whose  judgment  could  be 
accepted  as  judicial.  He  cared  nothing  for  any  cheaper 
praise  ;  but,  when  the  "  well  done  "  came  from  one  who  was 
entitled  to  pronounce  the  verdict,  then  he  received  it  with 
a  childlike  and  honorable  joy. 

But  his  work  brought  him,  indeed,  nobler  companionship 
than  any  I  have  named.  It  must  be  remembered  that  his 
work  was  the  study  of  the  New  Testament.  This  book  he 
studied  not  from  without  alone.  He  did  not  lose  himself  in 
the  technicalities  of  his  theme.  He  was  a  man  who  was 
saturated  through  and  through  with  the  New  Testament. 
He  knew  all  about  it  that  any  man  can  know :  of  its  out- 
ward history,  of  its  meaning,  and  further  than  that  he  was 
saturated  with  its  spirit.  The  more  he  studied  these  out- 
ward expressions,  this  outward  history,  the  more  he  seemed 
to  catch  the  inner  spirit.  For  a  man  like  him  it  was  a  joy 
to  live  thus  in  the  companionship  of  his  Master,  to  make  it 
the  business  of  his  life  to  understand  his  words,  to  draw  as 
near  as  he  could  into  sympathy  with  him. 

Such  was  the  joy  of  his  life.  And  yet,  as  we  look  upon 
his  work,  we  feel  how  incomplete  it  was.  Indeed,  when  we 
consider  his  spirit  such  as  I  have  described  it,  and  consider 
his  work  as  he  has  left  it,  I  think  none  of  us  who  knew  him 
with  any  intimacy  feel  as  though  one  had  left  us  who  had 
passed  the  prime  of  life.  He  was  approaching  rapidly  three- 
score years  and  ten ;  and  yet  such  was  his  buoyancy,  his 
enthusiasm,  such  the  condition  of  his  labor,  that  I  think  we 
all  feel  as  we  should  toward  one  who  was  smitten  down  in 
the  very  prime  of  life.  For  it  seemed  as  if  his  materials 
were  just  being  brought  into  that  shape  in  which  they  could 
be  put  to  the  most  effective  use,  as  if  moments  were  coming 
in  which  the  labor  of  these  years  would  at  last  reach  a 
climax  of  fruition.  Of  course,  at  any  moment  there  would 


be  much  before  him  to  be  completed ;  but  it  seems  to  those 
who  knew  him  as  if  it  were  a  young  man  taken  in  the  very 
midst  of  the  freshness  of  his  youth,  before  his  work  was 
accomplished. 

There  may  be  some  who  think  that,  after  all,  a  busy  life 
among  men,  a  stirring  life  that  influences  men  and  women, 
may  be  the  best  life.  As  I  think  of  this  life  of  Ezra  Abbot, 
I  am  reminded  of  some  piece  of  sculpture  that  has  been 
wrought  secretly  and  quietly  until  at  last  it  has  been  com- 
pleted ;  and  then  the  screens  are  -cast  aside,  and  it  stands 
out,  calling  forth  the  exultation  and  delight  of  men.  So  his 
life  was  wrought  out  in  secret.  How  few  of  those  living 
very  near  him  knew  much  about  him  !  They  saw  him  pass 
and  repass,  and  that  was  all.  But,  at  last,  it  is  completed. 
It  stands  forth  before  the  eyes  of  men.  Those  who  have 
seen  him  thus  for  years  wonder  to  see  its  beauty,  wonder  at 
the  appreciation  and  applause  which  comes  to  it  from  every 
land  in  which  the  New  Testament  is  studied.  They  find  it 
was  a  life  that  has  borne  rich  fruits  in  the  results  of  its  labors, 
rich  fruits  in  the  recognition  that  it  received.  And  the 
saintly  lesson  that  may  come  from  such  a  modest,  earnest, 
self-forgetful  life  as  this  may  outweigh  the  influence  which 
many  active,  stirring  men  may  add  to  the  life  that  is  about 
them. 


MEMORIAL    SERVICE. 


INTRODUCTORY     ADDRESS. 

BY    REV.    AUGUSTUS    WOODBURY. 

Brethren, —  We  come  to  this  service  with  feelings  both 
of  sorrow  and  gratitude.  Love  and  friendship  are  bowed 
down  by  the  burden  of  personal  grief.  The  world  of  sacred 
letters  —  that  large  community  of  scholars  who  are  engaged 
in  searching,  with  the  aid  of  the  Spirit,  the  deep  things  of 
God  and  divine  truth  —  is  touched  with  the  sense  of  a  great 
bereavement.  The  Christian  Church  —  by  whatever  name 
the  different  branches  of  the  great  vine  may  be  known  — 
mourns  the  death  of  a  devout  and  reverent  disciple,  who 
added  to  his  rare  wealth  of  learning  the  priceless  riches 
of  the  wisdom  that  is  from  above.  This  University,  beloved 
by  all  of  us  who  have  been  blessed  by  its  fostering  care, 
sadly  strikes  from  its  roll  of  living  instructors  the  name  of 
one  at  whose  feet  the  wisest  have  been  glad  to  sit. 

Yet  are  we  sincerely  grateful  that  God  gave  to  our  friend 
and  brother  those  gifts  which  he  used  so  faithfully  for  the 
benefit  of  his  fellow-men.  Such  lives  as  his  make  the 
world  sweet  and  clean,  and  life  itself  more  worth  living. 
Those  who  came  into  personal  companionship  with  him,  as 
friend  or  pupil  or  fellow-laborer  in  the  service  of  the  truth, 
must  ever  cherish  his  memory  with  a  feeling  of  thanks- 
giving for  their  association  with  this  gentle  and  kindly 
spirit  ;  while  those  who  only  knew  him  through  the  enjoy- 
ment of  the  fruits  of  his  learning  must  rejoice  that  he  has 
lived  to  cultivate  the  wide  field  in  which  he  was  engaged, 
and  bring  its  products  to  maturity.  Truly,  an  abundant 


17 

harvest,  in  the  growth  of  which  he  assiduously  and  unself- 
ishly labored,  glad  to  know  that  not  himself  but  others 
were  to  reap  ! 

It  is  my  province  this  afternoon  to  say  but  a  few  simple 
words  of  introduction.  The  associate  of  Dr.  Abbot  and 
the  successor  to  his  vacant  chair  in  the  Divinity  School 
will  speak  at  length  of  the  character  and  services  of  the 
deceased  scholar.  An  older  member  of  our  association, 
with  ready  sympathy  with  the  studies  and  pursuits  of  this 
servant  of  God,  will  give  voice  to  the  sentiments  of  his 
brethren  in  the  ministry.  It  suffices  for  me  to  express  the 
profound  appreciation  which  you  must  feel  with  myself 
of  the  value  of  this  life  which  has  ceased  its  activity  upon 
earth  to  renew  it  in  a  wider  and  higher  sphere  of  being. 
I  can  well  remember  when  Dr.  Abbot  began  his  career  at 
Cambridge  in  connection  with  the  University.  He  seemed 
then  fully  equipped  for  any  duty,  and  then  as  ever  after- 
wards he  was  most  generous  and  helpful  to  all  who  asked 
his  aid.  A  faithful  student  then  and  always,  his  ceaseless 
diligence  bore  its  fruits  in  after  years  in  the  unquestioned 
accuracy  of  the  scholar.  Let  no  one  cast  reproach  upon 
American  learning  in  the  highest  walks  of  literature  and 
life.  It  would  be  enough  —  if  we  could  mention  no  other 
honored  names  among  us  —  that  Ezra  Abbot  has  lived  and 
wrought.  We  make  no  narrow  claim,  for  the  republic  of 
letters  has  no  boundaries.  But  we  would  set  him  'forth  as 
an  illustrious  example  of  that  liberal  culture  of  mind  and 
heart  which  an  American  university  can  afford,  and  which, 
in  the  spirit  of  American  institutions,  finds  in  superior 
attainments  the  superior  opportunity  of  benefiting  man- 
kind. For  Dr.  Abbot  did  not  sit  down  to  enjoy  his  gath- 
ered wealth,  like  a  miser  gloating  over  the  treasure  he  had 
hoarded,  but  freely  opened  his  coffers,  and  with  lavish  pro- 
fusion poured  out  his  gifts  to  all  who  were  in  need.  The 
value  of  his  contributions  to  sacred  learning  is  beyond  com- 
putation. We  may  well  believe  that  it  will  be  more  and 
more  appreciated  as  successive  generations  come  to  know 
how  faithfully  this  modest,  thorough,  accurate  scholar  has 
done  his  work. 


i8 

That  the  spirit  of  an  earnest  and  sincere  faith  aided  Dr. 
Abbot  in  his  labor  we  can  confidently  be  assured.  For  here 
was  no  mere  textual  critic,  dealing  with  the  letter  that 
killeth.  The  text  was  the  medium  and  instrument,  the 
form  and  record.  But  through  them  breathed  the  spirit  of 
a  warm  and  fervent  piety,  a  devotion  to  divine  truth  rarely 
equalled ;  and  by  the  light  which  thus  shone  from  his  pure 
and  trustful  heart  the  text  and  the  record  were  illumined  as 
though  by  the  divine  glory.  A  tender  and  unselfish  love 
made  his  home  the  scene  of  a  serene  happiness,  and  the 
communications  of  friendship  an  unalloyed  delight.  It  is  not 
for  us  to  intrude  upon  the  privacy  of  domestic  sorrow.  But, 
with  full  and  appreciative  hearts,  we  can  express  our  cordial 
sympathy  with  those  who  mourn  the  bereavement  of  their 
best  affections. 

Can  such  a  man  die  ?  Has  God  no  further  employment 
for  this  well-furnished  mind  and  reverent  spirit  ?  To  have 
lived  thus  would  be  a  sufficient  crown  and  satisfaction  to 
any  one's  ambition.  But  it  is  yet  only  the  preparation  for 
higher  duties  and  serener  joys.  Still,  the  spirit  searches 
the  truth  and  sounds  the  deeps.  Going  forward  in  the 
heavenly  ways,  it  must  still  make  its  eternal  progress, 
changing  but  from  glory  to  glory  in  its  growth  to  holiness. 
Immortality  becomes  clearer  to  our  spiritual  vision,  and 
heaven  is  nearer  and  brighter  to  our  hope.  For  if  because 
of  him  'the  life  below  is  of  greater  value,  because  of  him 
also  the  life  above  draws  us  to  itself  with  stronger  force. 

"  Nor  blame  I  Death,  because  he  bare 
The  use  of  virtue  out  of  earth  : 
I  know  transplanted  human  worth 
Will  bloom  to  profit,  otherwhere." 


ADDRESS 

BY    REV.    A.    P.    PEABODY,    D.D. 

ON  the  list  of  Professors  of  Sacred  Literature  our  Cata- 
logue bears  but  three  names,  the  duties  of  the  office  having 
been,  for  more  than  thirty  years  after  the  resignation  of  the 
second  Professor,  annexed  to  those  of  the  Professor  of 
Hebrew.  The  three  names  are  those  of  Andrews  Norton, 
John  Gorham  Palfrey,  and  Ezra  Abbot.  The  first  two  were 
my  teachers  ;  the  second,  while  I  was  nominally  his  pastor 
for  more  than  twenty  years,  was  much  more  truly  my  pastor, 
to  whom  I  looked  as  a  guide  and  exemplar  in  all  that  apper- 
tains to  the  Christian  life  and  character.  They  are  both 
well  worthy  of  our  commemoration,  while  we  pay  our  special 
tribute  to  him  whose  recent  departure  from  us  has  made  us 
all  mourners. 

Andrews  Norton  was,  in  the  literal  and  best  sense  of  the 
word,  a  sceptic,  a  wary  inlooker  into  whatever  claimed  to  be 
believed,  one  who  sought  adequate  evidence,  and  rejected 
whatever  lacked  credentials.  At  the  side  of  his  risen  Lord, 
he  would  have  played  the  part  of  Thomas  ;  but,  once  con- 
vinced, no  power  of  earth  or  hell  could  have  shaken  his 
loyalty.  He  was  not  deficient  in  sentiment  or  in  creative 
imagination ;  but  he  suffered  himself  to  feel  only  what  he 
first  knew, —  he  built  only  with  materials  that  he  had  thor- 
oughly tested.  He  was  a  stout  iconoclast  as  to  many  old 
beliefs,  but  an  earnest  seeker  of  the  truth ;  and  to  him  the 
truth  that  he  recognized  was  as  the  present  God.  None 
who  heard  him  could  ever  forget  either  his  bold,  unsparing 
excision  of  whatever  bore  not  the  unmistakable  stamp  of 
genuineness  in  the  sacred  record,  or  the  profound  reverence 
with  which  he  approached  and  handled  what  he  regarded  as 
divine  oracles.  I  never  have  been  in  a  more  solemn  place 
than  his  lecture-room ;  and,  if  a  student  uttered  so  much 


20 

as  a  flippant  word  of  comment  or  question,  his  indignant 
rebuke  made  it  certain  that  the  offence  would  never  be  re- 
peated. His  argument  for  the  Genuineness  of  the  Gospels 
has  lost  none  of  its  validity ;  for  he  bases  his  reasoning  on 
the  admissions  of  those  who  claim  a  late  authorship  for  the 
Gospels,  throws  over  the  first  post-apostolic  century  a  mas- 
sive bridge  of  circumstantial  evidence,  and  then  quietly  fills 
in  the  chasm  by  substantiating  the  intervening  testimony 
which  he  has  already  shown  to  be  superfluous.  As  for  him- 
self, I  doubt  whether  he  had  a  firmer  conviction  of  his  own 
being  than  he  had  of  the  life  eternal  and  of  the  divine 
mission  of  him  in  whom  that  life  is  revealed  and  made 
manifest. 

Dr.  Palfrey  was  a  more  ready  believer ;  but  an  intensely 
tender,  keen,  and  imperative  conscience  would  not  surfer 
him  to  leave  any  vital  question  unexamined  or  any  essential 
testimony  unverified.  He  gave  the  most  hospitable  recep- 
tion to  inquiry,  to  diversity  of  opinion,  to  honest  doubt ; 
welcomed  new  light  from  whatever  quarter,  and  bestowed 
unresting  diligence  on  his  work  equally  as  a  learner  and  as 
a  teacher.  With  him,  too,  study  deepened  conviction  and 
strengthened  faith.  A  closer  follower  of  Christ  I  have 
never  known,  nor  have  I  ever  seen  years  of  infirmity  and 
suffering  irradiated  as  his  were  by  what  seemed  open  vision 
of  things  divine  and  eternal. 

My  intimacy  with  both  these  worthily  eminent  men 
impressed  strongly  upon  my  mind,  first,  the  necessity  of 
special  fitnesses  for  the  office  which  they  bore,  and,  sec- 
ondly, the  tendency  of  that  office,  fitly  borne,  to  intensify 
the  faith  which  it  implies. 

In  the  preparation  for  the  work,  I  includ'e  not  merely  the 
scholarly  aptitude,  the  linguistic  training,  the  conversance 
with  the  Hebrew  language  and  Scriptures  and  with  cognate 
dialects,  the  lack  of  which  would  of  course  denote  utter  and 
absolute  unfitness,  but  equally  a  profound  sense  of  the 
transcendent  worth  of  these  sacred  records  as  the  world's 
manual  of  truth  and  duty.  This  last  requisite  has  its  intel- 
lectual no  less  than  its  spiritual  significance.  No  man  is 


21 

a  fit  critic  of  that  with  which  he  is  not  in  full  sympathy. 
Bentley  was  the  most  learned  man  of  his  time ;  but  he  made 
a  fool  of  himself  by  his  attempted  emendations  of  the  Para- 
dise Lost,  simply  because  he  had  no  poetry  in  his  soul,  and 
no  knowledge  of  words  or  metres  could  bring  his  mind  into 
relation  with  Milton's.  A  great  deal  of  (so-called)  Biblical 
criticism  has  been,  for  like  reason,  equally  learned  and 
worthless.  Reliance  has  been  placed  on  the  critical  feeling, 
which  is  always  deserving  of  confidence  when  the  feeling 
has  reference  to  that  which  is  under  criticism,  but  otherwise 
is  mere  conceit  and  caprice.  If  the  New  Testament  is 
an  outgrown  record  of  doubtful  origin  and  still  more  ques- 
tionable authenticity,  on  the  same  plane  with  the  Alcoran, 
the  Vedas,  and  the  legends  of  Buddha,  it  is  not  worth  a 
professorship,  or  even  a  place  among  the  elective  studies  of 
a  divinity  school  which  shall  train  men  to  preach  each  his 
own  gospel.  It  is  only  for  its  religious  validity  and  worth 
that  it  claims  its  essential  and  foremost  place  in  the  educa- 
tion of  religious  teachers ;  and,  so  long  as  it  holds  that  place, 
it  should  have  for  its  interpreters  those  who  regard  it  with 
reverence  and  love.  Even  questions  as  to  its  external  his- 
tory cannot  be  fairly  considered  by  one  not  thus  disposed. 
An  ignorant  and  stupid  mind  will  of  course  believe  just 
what  it  wants  to  believe.  But  he  whose  mind  is  alert  and 
active  will  not  let  his  faith  rest  on  a  plausible  uncertainty. 
He  will  try  the  witnesses,  and  all  of  them,  with  the  most 
careful  research  and  thorough  diligence,  and  the  more  so 
because  he  is  deeply  concerned  and  profoundly  interested, 
just  as  an  able  and  acute  lawyer  would  employ  double 
caution  as  well  as  industry  in  determining  the  validity  of 
the  title  to  his  own  estate.  I  would  have  inquiry  free 
and  thorough ;  but  it  is  worthy  of  notice  that  Christianity 
and  its  sacred  books  are  the  only  subjects  of  intellectual 
and  scholarly  activity  on  which  it  is  ever  imagined  that  a 
deep  personal  interest  is  unfavorable  to  free  and  thorough 
inquiry. 

The  interpretation  of  the  New  Testament,  on  the  part  of 
equally  honest,  single-minded,  and  devout  critics,  may  take 


22 

legitimately  two  unlike  directions,  and  may  make  Christi- 
anity either  distinctly  evangelical  or  preponderatingly  Paul- 
ine in  its  type.  It  is  maintained,  on  the  one  hand,  that  we 
have  in  the  words  and  life  of  Christ  the  whole  of  his  relig- 
ion, that  he  did  not  intend  to  transmit  as  religious  truth 
aught  to  which  he  did  not  give  utterance  or  expression, 
and  that  St.  Paul's  seemingly  technical  phraseology  is  but 
the  mode  in  which  he  shapes  the  simple  verities  of  the 
gospel  to  meet  the  cavils  and  objections  of  the  Judaizing 
converts,  in  the  same  way  in  which  we,  in  combating  a 
religious  system  of  the  present  day,  should  use  many  terms 
which  we  should  not  employ  in  the  non-controversial  treat- 
ment of  our  own  beliefs.  I  think  that  our  friends  of  the 
Augustinian  theology  will  readily  admit  that  their  specific 
dogmas  are  not  derived  immediately  from  Christ,  and  would 
never  have  taken  shape  but  for  St.  Paul.  But  they,  in  their 
own  full  right  and  on  grounds  that  will  admit  of  clear 
exposition  and  not  unreasonable  defence,  maintain  that,  in 
accordance  with  Christ's  own  purpose,  Christianity  has  in 
St.  Paul's  Epistles  a  fuller  development  than  in  the  Gospels, 
and  that  these  Epistles,  therefore,  are  to  be  interpreted,  not 
as  the  application  to  peculiar  cases  and  circumstances  of  the 
truth  recorded  as  in  Christ's  own  words,  but  as  teaching,  on 
the  authority  of  an  inspired  apostle,  dogmas  which  would 
not  have  been  necessarily  inferred  from  the  Gospels,  had 
they  been  the  only  canonical  scriptures.  Critics  of  either 
school  are  so  kept  prolongedly  under  the  word-fall  from  the 
lips  of  him  who  spoke  as  never  man  spake  beside,  and 
when  they  turn  from  his  express  record  find  themselves  in 
such  intimate  converse  with  the  greatest  of  his  followers,  in 
whom  was  pre-eminently  the  mind  of  Christ,  that  the  course 
of  study  begun  with  a  believing  heart  ought  of  necessity  to 
issue  in  an  ever  firmer  faith  and  an  ever  more  loving  disci- 
pleship. 

Dr.  Abbot's  method  and  work  as  a  critic  will  be  more 
particularly  described  by  the  one  man  whom  those  who 
knew  them  both  could  not  fail  to  designate  and  welcome  as 
his  successor.  In  the  few  words  that  I  have  yet  to  say,  I 


23 

want  to  speak  of  the  spirit  which  Dr.  Abbot  brought  to  his 
office  and  of  what  his  office  did  for  him. 

His  very  name  suggests  special  aptitudes.  St.  Paul's 
doctrine  of  heredity,  implied  in  his  mention  of  Timothy's 
grandmother,  Lois,  and  his  mother,  Eunice,  has  had  its 
manifold  illustration  in  some  of  our  old  New  England  fami- 
lies, of  which  the  membership  is  almost  a  credential.  The 
various  branches  of  the  Abbot  family  have  been  singularly 
fruitful  in  lovers  of  the  divine  word,  in  men  whose  lives 
have  been  an  interpretation  of  the  gospel,  in  scholarly  men, 
too,  and  often  in  those  whose  marked  ability  and  learning 
would  have  been  commemorated,  had  they  not  been  cast 
into  the  shade  by  the  more  exceeding  lustre  of  their  piety. 

Dr.  Abbot's  deep  personal  interest  in  the  Christian  Script- 
ures must  have  given  a  tone  to  his  early  life  as  a  student. 
We  have  testimony  to  the  religious  trend  of  his  college 
course,  in  which  a  mind  like  his  can  have  slighted  nothing, 
yet  must  undoubtedly  have  levied  a  large  tribute  for 
sacred  uses  from  almost  every  part  of  the  college  curricu- 
lum. There  is  reason  to  suppose  that,  had  he  remained 
near  his  native  home,  he  would  have  been  none  the  less  a 
Biblical  student,  though  with  a  restricted  range  of  materials 
and  opportunities.  But  the  Providence  which  shapes  men's 
ends  so  often  without  their  forethought  led  him  to  Prof. 
Norton  at  the  very  time  when  the  professor's  waning  life 
and  unfinished  work  made  a  skilled  and  earnest  assistant  a 
special  godsend,  while  his  influence  was  adapted  to  intensify 
the  already  prominent  traits  of  mind  and  heart  of  his  des- 
tined successor, —  the  heir  equally  of  his  intrepid  research 
and  of  his  reverent  spirit. 

In  every  department  of  knowledge,  the  learner  must  be 
the  asker.  One  finds  only  what  he  seeks  ;  and  one's  moral 
qualities  and  spiritual  habitudes,  so  far  as  they  are  distinct 
and  strong,  are  interrogative.  Alongside  of  that  which  can 
nourish  and  satisfy  them,  they  are  questionings  and  crav- 
ings. They  can  find  in  the  gospel  a  vast  deal  that  would 
escape  the  eye  of  a  mere  linguistic  student.  Dr.  Abbot 
brought  to  the  New  Testament  a  spiritual  nature  which 


24 

yearned  for  what  it  found  there,  which  could  assimilate  and 
convert  into  its  own  substance  the  bread  from  heaven  there 
bestowed,  and  which  could  only  increase  its  hunger  by 
feeding  it.  He  wanted  for  himself  what  he  read  in  Christ's 
earthly  record.  There  was  in  him  a  rare  blending  of  the 
stronger  and  the  finer  elements  of  character.  He  had  a 
vigorous  grasp  and  an  unrelaxing  hold  on  opinions  once 
formed,  on  conclusions  fairly  reached.  He  was  not  satisfied 
with  belief  where  knowledge  was  attainable,  and  in  whatever 
admitted  of  doubt  his  beliefs  were  brought  into  as  close 
kindred  with  knowledge  as  the  means  of  inquiry  rendered 
possible.  He  had  strong  confidence  in  his  own  opinions, 
for  the  sufficient  reason  that  he  had  omitted  no  means 
within  his  reach  for  forming  and  verifying  them.  But 
among  these  means,  and  no  less  availing  than  the  critical 
apparatus  at  his  full  command,  were  those  tentacles  of  heart 
and  soul,  which  could  not  but  lay  hold  on  the  great  truths 
of  religion  which  it  is  their  very  nature  to  apprehend,  and 
which  must  of  necessity  fasten  on  all  that  is  vital  in  the 
gospel,  if  it  be  indeed  the  record  of  a  veritable  theophany. 
The  tenderness,  gentleness,  sweetness,  simplicity,  modesty, 
which  made  his  life  lovely,  were  cognitive  faculties  in  his 
special  department.  They  brought  him  into  relation  with 
Jesus  Christ.  They  revealed  to  him  else  hidden  depths  of 
meaning  in  the  Saviour's  teachings  and  life.  They  multi- 
plied for  him  points  of  receptivity  for  the  informing  and 
pervading  spirit  of  the  Divine  Master. 

These  traits,  which  sometimes  exist  in  so  loose  and  fluent 
a  form  as  to  be  feelings  rather  than  principles,  -were  in  him 
solidified,  yet  without  being  chilled,  by  rigid,  conscientious 
integrity.  His  spiritual  insight  and  sympathy  might  open 
meanings  to  him  else  unperceived ;  but  they  could  not 
warp  his  judgment  or  modify  his  decision,  as  to  matters 
of  evidence  or  interpretation.  He  could  see  in  a  text  of 
Scripture  what  he  would  have  preferred  not  to  see ;  and, 
in  such  a  case,  he  would  have  reported  precisely  what  he 
saw,  without  the  slightest  reserve  or  qualification.  With 
his  religious  opinions  as  firmly  fixed  as  those  of  any  fallible 


25 

man  ought  to  be,  and  with  these  opinions  held  as  precious 
and  cherished  elements  of  his  own  interior  life,  they  were 
never  his  reasons  for  the  exegesis  of  a  disputed  text,  still 
less  for  his  preference  of  a  disputed  reading. 

This  perfect  impartiality  was  of  peculiar  worth  in  the 
textual  criticism  of  the  New  Testament,  which  may  be  re- 
garded as  his  specialty.  It  may  be  safely  said  that,  in  all 
his  printed  discussions  of  the  various  readings  of  disputed 
texts,  it  would  be  impossible  to  find  an  instance  in  which 
his  theological  predilections  have  been  suffered  to  affect 
the  statement  of  evidence  as  derived  from  manuscripts,  ver- 
sions, and  quotations,  or  in  which  one  who  had  reached  a 
different  conclusion  from  his  could  impeach  his  perfect  fair- 
ness in  dealing  with  the  authorities  on  which  the  decision 
rests. 

There  were  yet  other  traits,  not  expressly  spiritual,  which 
bore  their  part  in  fitting  him  for  his  work.  Though  long 
practice  perfected  the  gift,  nature  must  have  endowed  him 
with  a  singularly  clear  and  keen  mental  vision.  Not  every 
mind  —  not  every  able  and  vigorous  mind  —  can  train  itself 
as  his  mind  was  trained  to  trace  minute  distinctions,  to  dis- 
criminate where  differences  are  almost  infinitesimal,  to 
mark  the  slightest  deviation  from  the  equipoise  of  balanced 
testimonies  or  arguments.  There  are  eyes  of  the  under- 
standing that  are  natively  microscopic,  while  none  the  less 
telescopic.  Such  eyes  the  Biblical  critic  needs,  conversant 
as  he  ought  to  be  equally  with  minutiae  which,  except  in  the 
sacred  records,  would  be  insignificant,  and  with  truths  broad 
and  vast  as  the  universe. 

I  cannot  but  trace  also  an  aptness  for  Dr.  Abbot's  work 
in  the  native  vein  of  wit  and  humor,  which  cropped  out  so 
gladsomely  in  his  rare  and  brief  seasons  of  relaxation.  Wit 
and  wisdom  are  close  of  kin.  Wit  depends  on  the  quick 
and  delicate  perception  of  likenesses  and  differences  between 
words  and  their  respective  meanings.  It  is  precisely  the 
same  faculty  in  its  more  serious  exercise  that  constitutes 
the  acumen,  skill,  divination  of  the  accomplished  critic  ; 
and  the  coincidence  of  these  two  phases  —  the  mirthful  and 


26 

the  grave  —  of  the  same  faculty,  is  on  record  in  not  a  few 
remarkable  instances,  including  even  that  grim  Coryphaeus 
of  Apocalyptic  and  prophetic  interpretation,  Joseph  Mede, 
and  that  sternest  of  moralists,  John  Foster. 

Dr.  Abbot's  was  a  place  of  privilege  no  less  than  of  ser- 
vice. It  was  good  for  him  to  be  thus  intimately  conversant 
with  the  Divine  Humanity  whose  record  was  at  once  his 
work  and  his  joy.  As  we  look  back  upon  his  life,  we  see 
that  he  grew  constantly  into  the  image  so  familiar  to  his 
study  and  contemplation.  His  virtues  were  those  of  the 
Beatitudes.  In  his  lowliness  of  spirit,  he  had  no  ambition 
to  shine;  yet  his  light  shone  far,  because  it  was  so  pure 
and  bright  that  it  could  not  be  hidden.  While  he  was  the 
cynosure  of  admiring  love  for  those  in  his  nearer  circle, 
none  came  within  the  sphere  of  his  influence  who  did  not 
feel  in  him  the  irresistibly  attractive  power  of  an  unselfish 
soul,  consecrated  to  the  service  of  God  and  man.  His 
light  shines  on,  none  the  less  bright  now  that  he  has  gone, 
and  that  we  can  number  up  the  tokens  of  benignity,  kind- 
ness, and  helpfulness,  strown  all  along  his  life-way,  which 
he  never  made  known,  but  which  are  recalled  at  this  time 
in  cumulative  memory  and  with  loving  gratitude.  When 
we  consider  his  constant  professional  engagements,  his 
extended  correspondence,  the  large  amount  of  his  own 
finished  work,  it  gives  us  a  new  sense  of  the  elasticity  of 
time  to  find  how  many  there  were  who  were  enriched  by 
his  painstaking  generosity,  enabled  through  his  aid  to  ren- 
der valuable  contributions  to  the  cause  of  sacred  literature, 
indebted  to  him  for  materials  and  for  their  efficient  use, 
dependent  on  him  for  the  completeness,  correction,  revision 
of  what,  but  for  him,  would  have  failed  in  great  part  of  its 
destined  purpose, —  services  for  which  there  was  no  earthly 
inducement,  often  not  even  due  recognition,  but  rendefed 
only  in  the  Master's  name  and  in  the  Master's  spirit. 

Then,  too,  we  cannot  but  remember  the  burden  of  fre- 
quent and  long  bodily  infirmity,  sustained  with  more  than 
submission, —  with  a  cheerful  courage  that  kept  the  spirit 
strong  and  brave,  kind  and  helpful,  too,  under  the  close  im- 


27 

pending  shadow  of  death,  the  outward  man  perishing  while 
the  inward  man  was  renewed  day  by  day.  Such  a  body, 
wan,  wasted,  lingering  so  long  on  the  very  brink  of  the 
grave;  such  a  soul,  full  of  light  and  love  and  peace, —  what 
so  sure  pledge  can  we  have  this  side  of  heaven  of  those 
words  of  the  Lord,  "  He  that  believeth  on  me,  though  he 
were  dead,  yet  shall  he  live ;  and  whosoever  liveth  and 
believeth  in  me  shall  never  die"  ? 


ADDRESS. 

BY    PROF.    JOSEPH    HENRY    THAYER,    D.D. 

THE  embarrassment  besetting  any  one  presuming  to  speak 
publicly  in  commendation  of  a  man  whose  modesty  and 
reserve  were  extreme  is  augmented  on  the  present  occasion 
by  the  fact  that  he  has  already  been  commemorated,  ten- 
derly and  truthfully,  by  both  tongue  and  pen.  Not  that  the 
last  word  about  Ezra  Abbot  has  been  spoken  :  admiration 
for  scholarship  and  love  for  guileless  excellence  must  per- 
ish before  that  time  comes  to  us  who  knew  him  ;  but,  when 
summoned  by  those  who  did  not  enjoy  this  privilege  to  tell 
them  what  it  was  which  entitles  this  feeble  and  secluded 
scholar  to  an  exalted  place  among  great  men,  we  are  half- 
disconcerted  by  the  summons  for  the  moment.  There  are 
America'n  authors  whose  books  can  be  reckoned  up  by  the 
score,  and  their  circulation  by  scores  of  thousands  of  cop- 
ies. The  largest  work  which  Dr.  Abbot  wrote  is  an  essay 
rather  than  a  treatise,  a  monograph  barely  exceeding  one 
hundred  pages,  known  and  prized  by  few  persons  except 
scholars.  There  are  American  teachers  whose  quickening 
words  are  heard  annually  by  hundreds  that  spread  their 
fame  through  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  land.  Prof. 
Abbot  spoke  year  after  year  to  less  than  a  score  of  pupils. 
There  are  American  scholars  in  whom  wealth  of  learning 
is  so  wedded  to  skill  in  public  address  that  the  great  multi- 
tude confess  the  enchantment  of  their  words.  Dr.  Abbot 
probably  never  made  an  unpremeditated  public  speech  in 
his  life,  and  was  physically  incapable  of  making  himself 
easily  heard  in  a  crowded  assembly  for  half  an  hour.  Yet 
the  eloquent  speaker,  the  successful  teacher,  the  voluminous 
writer  appear  but  as  ordinary  men  by  the  side  of  the  excep- 
tional gifts  and  achievements  of  this  retired,  erudite,  labori- 
ous, disinterested  Christian  scholar. 


29 

The  glimpses  given  us  of  his  childhood  disclose  in  a  rudi- 
mentary stage  many  of  those  qualities  which  distinguished  his 
mature  years,  but  his  precocity  seems  to  have  been  quite 
free  from  the  pertness  which  generally  renders  youthful  prod- 
igies repulsive.  At  nineteen  months,  he  knew  his  letters ; 
and,  when  in  church  the  usual  sedative  of  a  book  was  given 
him,  he  broke  out  in  self-forgetful  exclamations  of  joy  at 
some  success  in  deciphering.  At  five,  he  is  promoted  into 
the  first  class  in  reading,  although,  to  equalize  his  diminu- 
tiveness  with  the  average  stature,  he  is  required  to  stand 
upon  the  bench.  At  seven,  he  has  finished  his  arithmetic, 
and  gained  the  name  of  being  wonderfully  fond  of  books. 
He  is  found  reading  Rollin's  Ancient  History,  and  declares 
it  to  be  very  interesting, —  a  pleasant  incident  for  lovers  of 
Rollin  to  come  upon. 

Under  the  primitive  regulations  of  the  frontier  school 
which  he  attended,  the  pupils  were  left  to  set  their  own  les- 
sons, making  them  longer  or  shorter  as  ability  or  pleasure 
dictated.  On  one  occasion,  he  instigated  a  bright  compan- 
ion to  offer  the  whole  of  "old  Murray"  at  a  recitation. 
Recitations  of  this  sort  taxed  the  power  of  the  teacher  more 
than  that  of  his  pupil.  The  hearing  of  them  was  accordingly 
delegated  to  some  of  the  older  scholars.  Once,  having 
asked  the  miss  that  sat  next  him  how  to  spell  "  mosquito!' 
and  been  answered  by  the  nimble-witted  little  ignoramus, 
"You  can  spell  it  a  dozen  ways,"  our  infant  philologer  sets 
himself  to  work  and  tabulates  just  twelve  different  spellings 
with  their  several  vouchers.  In  these  early  days,  too,  he 
gets  access  to  Shakspere  and  Scott,  and  finds  them  more 
entertaining  than  play.  But  he  is  not  a  bit  priggish  :  enters 
into  all  the  childish  games  with  all  a  child's  glee ;  can  run 
faster  than  any  other  boy  in  the  school  except  one ;  is  an 
expert  at  catching  trout ;  a  capital  story-teller,  and  such 
good  company  generally  as  to  prompt  the  cousin,  at  whose 
father's  house  he  was  accustomed  to  stay  when  the  severity 
of  the  winter  in  Maine  forbade  him  to  take  his  three-mile 
walk  to  his  home,  to  pray  for  rough  weather. 

Once,  when  the  two  take  refuge  under  a  bridge  from  a 


30 

thunder-shower,  he  holds  forth  upon  electricity,  and  con- 
cludes his  lecture  with  the  consolatory  assurance  that,  if 
they  are  struck  and  not  killed,  but  only  stunned,  they  will 
revive  on  falling  into  the  water. 

In  the  routine  of  farm-life,  he  generally  reads  while  he 
rides  his  loaded  horse  to  and  from  the  mill ;  yet  he  is  enter- 
prising in  agriculture,  fond  of  experiment,  dissatisfied  with 
himself  unless  he  accomplishes  as  much  as  his  more  robust 
and  less  studious  associates. 

Having  exhausted  the  scanty  resources  for  getting  an 
education  which  the  vicinity  of  his  home  affords,  he  is  sent 
to  continue  his  studies  with  his  mother's  brother,  the  Rev. 
Abiel  Abbot,  of  Peterboro.  The  reverend  gentleman,  like 
all  the  lad's  other  teachers,  is  so  impressed  with  his  "  won- 
derful accuracy  of  knowledge  "  and  his  eagerness  for  books 
that  he  adds  his  advice  to  that  of  the  rest,  and  induces  the 
father  to  surrender  his  cherished  hope  of  having  his  son 
follow  his  own  calling,  and  to  consent  to  his  entering  Phil- 
lips Exeter  Academy  and  preparing  for  college.  His  fellow- 
students  at  Bowdoin  soon  recognized  his  superiority,  and 
predicted  for  him  the  distinction  as  a  scholar  which  he 
afterwards  gained.  A  living  instructor  recalls  the  admi- 
ration stirred  in  him  as  the  young  student  (in  the  familiar- 
ity of  the  academic  life  of  .those  days)  put  to  him  a  casual 
question  about  a  passage  in  Livy,  and  thus  gave  him  the 
sight  of  a  text-book  the  margin  of  which  was  crowded  with 
scholarly  annotations  in  a  chirography  like  copperplate. 
His  room-mate,  still  surviving,  gives  an  interesting  account 
of  the  avocations  of  the  young  recluse,  for  such  the  average, 
easy-going  collegian  esteemed  him  :  his  botanical  strolls  of  a 
Saturday  afternoon  through  the  fields  and  woods  ;  his  volun- 
tary excursions,  too,  into  fields  of  literature  not  traversed 
by  the  college  curriculum.  The  De  Officiis  is  one  of  the 
books  these  unfledged  critics  read  and  annotate  together,  and 
then  exchange  their  copies ;  and,  in  the  repeated  discussions 
they  hold  respecting  the  accuracy  of  the  renderings  in  our 
English  New  Testament,  it  is  interesting  to  learn  that  the 
late  Prof.  Henry  B.  Smith,  then  a  tutor  at  Bowdoin  and  after- 


wards  associated  with  Dr.  Abbot  —  although,  alas !  only  in 
name  —  upon  the  American  Board  of  Revisers,  is  frequently 
called  in  as  umpire. 

But  biographical  details  belonging  to  his  subsequent  ca- 
reer as  a  teacher,  a  librarian,  a  professor,  must  be  passed 
over,  that  I  may  not  weary  your  patience  in  speaking  of  his 
work  as  a  Biblical  scholar. 

For  his  early  interest  in  the  sacred  Scriptures,  he  seems 
to  have  been  mainly  indebted  to  his  mother, —  a  woman  of 
an  active  mind,  who  followed  keenly  the  discussion  of  the 
theological  questions  which  stirred  New  England  thought 
in  those  days,  whose  little  collection  of  works  on  controver- 
sial divinity  is  believed  to  have  shaped  the  doctrinal  prefer- 
ences of  her  son,  and  whose  personal  thirst  for  knowledge  at 
first  hand  may  be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  in  her  young 
maternal  life  —  cut  off  at  the  end  of  seven  years  —  she 
learned  Greek,  that  she  might  read  for  herself  the  writings 
of  the  apostles  in  their  vernacular.  No  wonder  the  son  of 
such  a  mother  used  to  spend  the  intermission  between  the 
Sunday  services  in  studying  his  Greek  Testament ;  used  to 
translate  from  the  original,  as  he  conducted  the  devotional 
meetings  in  college ;  read  the  same  precious  book  in  after 
years  as  he  sat  in  his  pew  awaiting  the  opening  of  public 
worship ;  travelled  with  a  copy  of  it  in  his  pocket ;  could 
quote  it  almost  at  pleasure,  and  refer  an  inquirer  often  to 
the  very  chapter  and  verse  where  a  desired  passage  was  to 
be  found.  Dr.  Abbot's  learning  in  all  its  vastness  centred 
in,  radiated  from,  was  tributary  to  the  Sacred  Record.  Com- 
mend me  to  the  man  of  one  book,  especially  if  that  be  the 
Book  of  books  ! 

When  Dr.  Abbot  began  to  write  on  textual  subjects,  the 
time  was  not  in  all  respects  propitious.  The  curiosity  which 
sacred  criticism  had  aroused  in  its  earlier  stages  had  mainly 
died  away.  Its  results,  as  familiarized  to  clerical  minds  by 
the  current  reprints  of  Griesbach's  text,  had  elicited  the 
confession  on  all  hands  that,  as  respects  the  substance  of 
our  sacred  records,  there  is  little  to  choose  between  the  latest 


32 

printed  copy  and  the  oldest  manuscript  exemplars.  The 
peculiarities  of  the  latter,  therefore,  were  rendered  by  this 
admission  more  and  more  matters  of  antiquarian  interest. 
The  average  student  cared  little  about  them.  By  the  unin- 
structed  public,  on  the  other  hand,  they  were  regarded  with 
disfavor.  For,  to  the  ordinary  Christian  believer,  his  Eng- 
lish Bible  was  the  final  authority.  Its  language  was  ac- 
cepted, exactly  as  it  stood,  with  unquestioning  deference. 
Every  jot  and  tittle  of  its  text  carried  to  his  mind  the  au- 
thority of  a  uThus  saith  the  Lord."  Its  very  words  could 
hardly  have  been  more  sacred  had  they  been  taken  down  as 
they  fell  from  the  lips  of  our  Lord  and  his  apostles,  and 
printed  —  to  borrow  the  phrase  of  Bentley  respecting  the 
Greek  text  of  Stephens  —  by  an  angel  acting  as  compositor. 
Indeed,  little  more  than  twenty-five  years  have  yet  elapsed 
since,  as  will  be  remembered,  our  National  Bible  Society  — 
after  having  devoted  three  years  and  a  half,  by  a  committee 
under  the  supervision  of  such  judicious  Biblical  scholars 
as  Prof.  Edward  Robinson  and  Samuel  H.  Turner,  to  rid- 
ding our  current  English  Bibles  of  the  twenty-four  thousand 
or  more  variations,  chiefly  of  a  typographical  nature,  which 
had  crept  into  them — found  itself  compelled  to  revoke  its 
action,  under  clamoring  charges  of  "  tinkering  up  "  the  sacred 
text  and  "debasing  the  standard."  And  the  prevalent  senti- 
ment of  the  times  in  the  scholarly  world,  even,  may  be 
judged  of  from  the  nai'vete  of  the  statement  of  Alford,  who, 
in  publishing  the  first  edition  of  his  Greek  Testament,  con- 
fesses that  he  gives  only  a  "provisional  text,  the  one  best 
suited  to  the  intended  use  of  his  edition  under  present  cir- 
cumstances ";  one  "which  may  be  regarded  as  an  experi- 
ment how  far  the  public  mind  in  England  may  be  disposed 
to  receive  even  the  first  and  plainest  results  of  the  now  ad- 
vanced state  of  textual  criticism." 

In  New  England,  to  be  sure,  the  ignorance  on  textual 
subjects  was  less  dense;  but  its  jealousy  was  intensified  by 
the  circumstance  that  theological  feeling  ran  high,  and  that 
the  passages  of  special  interest  to  the  textual  critic  were  the 
battle-ground  of  the  champions  of  the  rival  doctrinal  sys- 


33 

terns  then  dividing  the  community.  The  question  of  the 
truth  or  falsity  of  Orthodoxy  seemed,  to  the  average  dis- 
putant of  those  days,  to  turn  on  the  number  of  unequivocal 
proof-texts,  more  or  less,  that  could  be  brought  forward  on 
the  one  side  or  the  other.  Anything  which  called  in  question 
the  validity  of  a  passage  for  use  as  an  orthodox  argument 
was  looked  on  with  suspicion  and  dislike.  The  very  names 
of  Wetstein,  Griesbach,  and  the  rest  became  odious.  Proba- 
bly not  a  few  persons  of  that  day  supposed  them  to  be  the 
names  of  men  who  rejected  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  and 
repudiated  the  "faith  once  delivered  to  the  saints."  Any 
one  interested  in  exposing  the  dubiousness  of  a  doctrinal  read- 
ing hitherto  accredited  was  suspected  of  covert  hostility  or 
partisanship,  as  though  he  created  the  facts  which  he  made 
known. 

Such  suspicions  Dr.  Abbot  took  no  pains  to  shun.  The 
first  results  of  any  considerable  magnitude  of  his  critical 
studies  were  given  to  the  world  in  connection  with  the 
publications  of  Prof.  Norton,  confessedly  one  of  the  fore- 
most and  most  inflexible  advocates  of  what  was  known 
as  "liberal  Christianity,"  little  as  he  liked  the  name  of 
"  Unitarian."  Appended  to  the  first  volume  of  Mr.  Norton's 
Translation  of  the  Gospels,  with  Notes,  published  (in  2  vols., 
8vo.  in  1855)  under  the  editorial  supervision  of  the  author's 
son  and  Dr.  Abbot,  is  an  extended  Table  prepared  by  the 
latter,  exhibiting  the  various  readings  adopted  in  that 
translation  in  preference  to  those  followed  in  the  Common 
Version ;  and,  throughout  the  volume  of  notes,  there  are 
scattered  evidences  of  his  scholarly  vigilance  which  abun- 
dantly warrant  the  commendation  passed  by  a  contemporary 
who  professed  to  "know  something  of  the  diligent  and  con- 
scientious pains  spent  by  the  editors,  by  day  and  by  night, 
for  many  months  in  the  work."  Similar  care  was  expended 
by  him  upon  the  second  edition  of  Norton's  Statement  of 
Reasons  for  not  believing  the  Doctrines  of  Trinitarians,  a 
book  which  appeared  the  next  year,  equipped  with  copious 
indexes  prepared  by  Dr.  Abbot,  and  .enlarged  with  many 
references  and  notes  from  his  hand,  more  especially  one 


34 

extending  to  nearly  fifty  closely  printed  pages,  and  devoted 
to  a  consideration  of  the  various  readings  in  certain  pas- 
sages supposed  to  have  a  bearing  on  the  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity.  In  the  animated  discussions,  also,  which  a  few 
years  later  engaged  the  religious  journals  of  this  part  of 
the  State  over  the  sermon  on  the  Trinity  preached  by  one 
who  then  held  the  Plummer  Professorship  in  our  Univer- 
sity, Dr.  Abbot  took  part  on  the  Unitarian  side ;  restricting 
himself,  however,  in  the  main  to  matters  of  history  and 
Biblical  interpretation.  About  this  same  time,  he  reprinted 
and  furnished  with  notes  and  an  appendix  Orme's  Memoir 
of  the  Controversy  respecting  the  Three  Heavenly  Witnesses. 
More  than  once,  too, — 'if  I  mistake  not, —  in  the  ten  or 
twelve  years  intervening  between  this  time  and  the  first 
assembling  of  the  American  Committee  for  the  Revision 
of  our  English  Bible,  he  participated,  through  the  columns 
of  the  New  York  Independent  and  perhaps  of  other  journals, 
in  doctrinal  controversy  involving  some  point  of  textual  or 
patristic  learning.* 

Naturally  enough,  therefore,  when  the  spirit  of  the  times 
is  considered,  together  with  the  sharpness  and  skill  which 
characterized  our  friend  as  a  disputant,  his  name  may  have 
passed,  with  many  who  had  no  personal  knowledge  of  him, 
as  that  of  a  wary  and  learned  yet  partisan  and  pugnacious 
disputant.f 

If  such  was  the  man  any  members  of  the  revising  body  — 
or,  I  may  add,  any  other  Christian  scholars  at  any  time  — 
expected  to  meet  in  Dr.  Abbot,  there  was  in  store  for  them 
a  most  agreeable  disappointment.  His  physical  character- 
istics, even, —  his  slight  frame,  mild  eye,  tenuous  voice, —  his 
quietness  of  manner,  his  intellectual  courtesy, —  all  the  more 
conspicuous  because  of  his  occasional  absorbed  forgetful- 
ness  of  some  petty  punctilio  of  conventional  etiquette, —  his 
deferential  attention  to  what  others  might  say,  his  delicate 

*  See  Appendix,  List  of  Publications. 

t  A  similar  misjudgment,  arising  from  his  theological  associations,  seems  to  have  biassed  Dr. 
Tregelles's  estimate  of  his  exhibition  of  authorities  concerning  the  text  in  John  i.,  18:  see 
Home's  Introduction,  etc.,  nth  ed.,  vol.  iv.  (Introduction  to  the  New  Testament,  edited  by 
S.  Prideaux  Tregelles),  p.  780,  seq. ,  note,  and  compare  Dr.  Abbot's  re-examination  of  the  passage 
in  the  Bibliotheca  Sacra  for  October,  1861,  pp.  840-872. 


or  THE 
UN1VER8IT 


35 


i !  7  Y     I 


avoidance  of  everything  offensive  in  his  manner  of  opposing 
them  and  in  the  statement  of  his  own  views,  above  all  his 
conspicuous  desire  to  bring  out  the  whole  truth  on  a  point 
of  controversy,  whether  the  disclosure  made  for  or  against 
his  own  position,  soon  convinced  all  that  they  were  asso- 
ciating with  a  model  Christian  scholar. 

The  discussions  around  the  revision  table  naturally 
involved  in  due  course  the  passages  which  had  played 
a  prominent  part  in  the  Unitarian  controversy.  But  there, 
as  elsewhere,  debate  moved  on  such  a  level  as  to  call  out  no 
suggestion  of  a  disputant's  personal  faith ;  while  so  thorough 
was  Dr.  Abbot's  mastery  of  critical  details,  so  impartial  his 
method  of  handling  them,  that  by  common  consent  he  was 
once  and  again  requested  to  give  the  evidence,  sustaining 
a  conclusion  reached  by  the  company,  its  form  for  trans- 
mission to  the  revisers  across  the  ocean. 

Minute  details  are  evidently  out  of  place  here.  Persons 
interested  in  such  discussions  will  find  themselves  rewarded 
by  examining  his  essays  on  the  much  controverted  texts 
alluded  to,  as  they  have  been  given  to  the  public  in  the 
pages  of  the  Bibliotheca  Sacra,  the  Unitarian  Review,  the 
Journal  of  the  Society  of  Biblical  Literature  and  Exegesis, 
and  the  Appendix  to  Norton's  Statement  of  Reasons,  already 
mentioned.  His  more  striking  characteristics,  however,  as 
a  critic  may  be  briefly  specified. 

Foremost  among  them  stands  a  quality  which  may,  per- 
haps, be  called  originality, —  originality  not  in  the  sense  of 
inventiveness,  a  sense  in  which  it  has  but  a  very  limited  or 
doubtful  application  to  a  science  busied  mainly  with  the 
collection  and  presentation  of  evidence,  but  originality  as 
opposed  to  the  practice  of  borrowing  knowledge  at  second- 
hand. He  brought  forward  no  hearsay  testimony,  but  held 
a  personal  interview  with  every  witness  he  summoned,  heard 
and  sifted  his  story  in  private  before  adducing  it  as  evidence. 
It  may  surprise  some  persons  that  this  practice  should  be 
mentioned  as  an  especial  merit :  it  is  so  obviously  the  dic- 
tate of  honesty  that  its  neglect  might  seem  to  savor  of 
inveracity.  But  so  numerous,  are  the  testimonies,  and  rec- 


36 

ondite  and  cumbersome  and  difficult  of  access  to  the  average 
scholar  and  dubious  of  interpretation  often  when  found,  that 
the  practice  of  taking  the  statements  respecting  a  text  or 
a  Father,  which  are  given  by  the  laborious  collectors  from 
Mill  to  Tischendorf,  has  become  far  more  common  than  it 
is  excusable.  ,Dr.  Abbot's  practice  was  the  reverse.  He 
used  not  the  eyes  of  others  but  his  own.  Even  in  his  last 
illness,  he  politely  declined  a  friend's  offer  to  ascertain  for 
him  the  evidence  of  a  certain  Father  respecting  a  passage 
in  debate,  and  requested  that  the  book  be  brought  him  from 
the  library. 

As  might  be  anticipated,  his  next  characteristic  was 
accuracy.  Indeed,  that  accuracy  which  scholars  came  to 
count  upon  in  everything  bearing  his  name  was  largely 
secured  by  this  practice  of  going  to  the  primary  authorities 
for  himself.  Editors  and  critics,  through  the  decades,  have 
blindly  copied  one  another,  and  been  liberally  aided  by  the 
inadvertence  and  ignorance  or — what  is  quite  as  dangerous 
—  the  fancied  wisdom  of  the  printers,  till  the  number  of 
errors  respecting  the  authorities  professedly  cited  is  almost 
incredible.  Dr.  Abbot's  labors  contributed  nothing  to  mul- 
tiply, little  or  nothing,  I  believe,  to  perpetuate  —  on  the  con- 
trary, very  much  to  expose  and  correct  —  these  errors.  In 
printing  an  article  of  importance,  it  was  his  practice  to  test 
the  type-setter's  accuracy,  not  by  his  manuscript,  but  by 
re-verification.  The  services  rendered  by  Dr.  Abbot  in 
correcting  oversights  in  the  work  of  others,  as  well  as  by 
avoiding  the  like  in  his  own,  have  been  many  and  great, 
and,  it  gives  me  pleasure  to  add  after  an  inspection  of  his 
copy  of  Scrivener's  Introduction,  are  not,  as  I  believe, 
wholly  ended. 

A  third  excellence  conspicuous  in  Dr.  Abbot's  work  as  a 
critic  is  its  thoroughness.  His  research  was  almost  unlimited. 
It  was  his  standing  maxim  to  "go  to  the  bottom  "  of  a  sub- 
ject. Any  confusion  or  conflict  of  testimony  made  and  kept 
him  uneasy  till  he  had  cleared  it  up.  Hours,  days,  yes,  the 
leisure  sometimes  of  weeks,  has  he  spent  in  settling  a  claim 
to  priority,  the  accuracy  of  a  reference,  the  meaning  of  an 


37 

abbreviation,  even  the  correct  spelling  of  a  name.  The 
hope  of  untying  some  critical  knot  would  kindle  his  zeal 
to  a  white  heat.  The  patience  of  his  exploration,  its  in- 
genuity, its  fertility,  its  quickness  in  detecting  and  adroit- 
ness in  pursuing  any  clew,  were  marvellous ;  and  the  fresh 
spontaneousness  of  his  joy  at  discovery  as  contagious  as  it 
was  charming.  A  dubious  reading  was  to  him  a  summons 
to  study.  A  question  which  "baffled  him  at  the  moment 
was  not  dismissed,  but  kept  standing.  He  sought  infor- 
mation indefatigably.  More  than  once,  when  the  libraries 
of  this  country  have  failed  him,  has  he  sent  to  Europe  for 
some  needed  book.  More  than  once  has  he  availed  himself 
of  the  courtesy  of  foreign  librarians  and  scholars  in  shedding 
light  on  some  obscurity.  Outstanding  requests  of  the  sort, 
to  be  complied  with  as  opportunity  may  offer,  are  probably 
still  in  the  hands  of  other  explorers  besides  the  enterprising 
expert  with  whom  it  was  his  pleasure  to  labor  in  preparing 
the  Prolegomena  to  Tischendorf  s  Greek  Testament. 

This  thoroughness  of  research  resulted  in  a  corresponding 
affluence  of  treatment.  Not  only  does  he  do  clean  work 
within  the  precise  field  of  discussion,  taking  his  reader  with 
him  through  every  nook  and  hollow  and  thicket  wherever 
anything  adverse  may  by  possibility  be  thought  to  lurk,  but 
he  gives  him  incidentally  and  on  the  way  a  deal  of  informa- 
tion about  matters  respecting  which  perhaps  he  has  first 
stirred  his  interest.  Hence,  it  comes  to  pass  that  his  essays 
are  replete  with  erudition,  and  often  gladden  a  scholar  by 
giving  him,  packed  away  in  a  foot-note,  results  for  which  he 
has  long  sought. 

Again,  Prof.  Abbot's  critical  work  is  characterized  by 
good  judgment.  He  avoided  the  indiscriminateness  which 
often  mars  the  results  of  hasty  or  one-sided  investigators. 
He  was  well  aware  of  the  many  and  delicate  considerations 
to  be  taken  into  account  in  making  up  a  wise  decision  con- 
cerning certain  kinds  of  critical  evidence.  What  weight, 
for  instance,  is  the  supposed  testimony  of  a  certain  Father 
entitled  to  in  a  given  case  ?  To  answer  the  question,  the 
genuineness  of  the  works  attributed  to  him  must  be  deter- 


38 

mined,  the  trustworthiness  of  their  extant  text,  the  validity 
of  apparent  quotations  or  allusions  involving  the  passage 
in  question  when  tested  by  the  context  or  other  parts  of  his 
writings,  his  general  habit  in  quoting  Scripture,  his  personal 
history  and  characteristics,  his  known  opinions,  and  his  rela- 
tions to  the  doctrinal  disputes  and  ecclesiastical  parties  of 
his  day.  The  ability  to  reach  a  correct  decision  on  a  ques- 
tion involving  many  particulars  of  this  sort  is  something 
quite  other  than  the  ability  to  translate  ancient  tongues  and 
ransack  indexes.  Dr.  Abbot's  friends  may  note  with  satis- 
faction that  his  expressed  opinions  respecting  the  character 
of  the  Speculum  falsely  ascribed  to  Augustine,  the  ungen- 
uineness  of  the  homilies  on  the  Acts  which  bear  the  name 
of  Chrysostom,  the  untrustworthiness  of  Primasius  as  a 
supposed  representative  of  the  Old  Latin  version,  and  other 
points,  are  becoming  the  accepted  opinions  with  critical 
scholars.  But,  quite  independent  of  any  particular  opinions 
he  may  have  expressed,  there  is  a  general  calmness  and  dis- 
creetness and  equipoise  characterizing  his  discussions,  which 
mark  him  as  a  man  of  singularly  well-balanced  judgment. 

Once  more  and  above  all,  Prof.  Abbot  as  a  critic  exhibits 
conspicuous  candor.  With  all  his  caution,  it  is  plain  to 
every  reader  that  he  is  a  man  of  positive  opinions,  which  he 
does  not  mean  to  disguise.  But,  in  the  advocacy  of  them, 
he  evidently  studies  to  be  scrupulously  fair.  He  is  not 
engaged  in  making  out  a  case.  He  does  not  write  like 
a  man  who  has  made  up  his  mind  in  advance  what  conclu- 
sion he  will  reach,  and  is  merely  engaged  in  looking  up 
facts  to  support  it.  History  with  him  is  not  dogmatics  in 
disguise.  Nor  does  he  so  far  play  the  partisan  as  to  leave 
the  mention  of  counter-evidence  to  the  advocates  of  the 
other  side.  When  he  searches  an  author  for  evidence 
affecting  a  disputed  reading,  he  gives  us  all  the  evidence  he 
finds.  If  his  opponent  is  thereby  enriched,  he  rejoices  with 
the  rejoicer.  He  makes  it  a  matter  of  religion  to.  avoid 
everything  like  approximation  to  that  suppression  of  the 
truth  which  is  only  falsehood  in  disguise.  Well  do  I  re- 
member his  sad  shake  of  the  head  when  a  certain  prominent 


39 

disputant,  on  being  proved  to  have  misplaced  his  confidence 
in  authorities,  kept  silence  instead  of  making  frank  con- 
fession. And  after  reading  a  recent  over-confident  defence 
of  the  received  text  in  I.  Tim.  iii.,  16,  he  exclaimed,  "I 
will  demolish  his  argument ;  but  I  must  first  send  him  three 
or  four  witnesses  in  his  favor,  which  he  has  overlooked." 

In  short,  for  a  happy  union  of  all  the  qualities  which  go 
to  make  up  a  masterly  textual  critic,  this  country  certainly 
never  furnished  his  equal ;  and  it  is  doubtful  whether  the 
world  has  seen  his  superior.  When  his  opportunities  and 
the  resources  at  his  command  are  considered,  his  achieve- 
ments are  surprising.  By  the  aid  of  the  printed  editions 
only  of  the  Sinaitic  and  Vatican  manuscripts,  together  with 
those  other  generally  accessible  helps  which  are  all  our 
western  world  can  command,  he  was  able  to  expose  the 
untenableness  of  the  arguments  of  a  foreign  critic,  who, 
speaking  from  actual  inspection  of  both  documents,  contro- 
verted the  opinion  of  Tischendorf  and  other  palaeographers 
respecting  the  relative  age  of  the  two.  In  the  same  essay, 
too,  he  makes  known  several  minor  palaeographic  facts, 
which,  it  is  believed,  had  previously  escaped  notice.  And 
the  quality  of  his  work  may  be  judged  of  from  the  estimate 
put  upon  a  sample  of  it  by  Prof.  Hort,  unquestionably  the 
most  acute  and  learned  critic  of  England.  In  the  preface 
to  the  Dissertation  which  the  latter  published  in  1876  on 
the  reading  "only  begotten  God"  in  John  i.,  18, —  a  disser- 
tation, by  the  way,  which  advocates  the  opposite  conclusion 
from  that  defended  by  Dr.  Abbot, —  he  says,  "  Only  once 
has  the  evidence  been  discussed  with  anything  like  adequate 
care  and  precision ;  namely,  in  a  valuable  article  contributed 
by  Prof.  Ezra  Abbot  to  the  American  Bibliotheca  Sacra  of 
October,  1861."  That  discussion  Dr.  Abbot  supplemented 
at  considerable  length,  in  1875,  in  connection  with  the  work 
of  revision  ;  and,  although  the  reading  "God  "  still  receives 
the  preference  of  such  critics  as  Tregelles  and  Westcott  and 
Hort  in  England,  Harnack  and  Weiss  in  Germany,  there 
is  reason  to  believe  Prof.  Abbot's  arguments  to  have  had 
influence  in  leading  Tischendorf  to  return  to  the  reading 


40 

"Son,"  after  having  adopted  the  other  in  one  form  of  his 
text ;  while  the  revisers  as  a  body  on  both  sides  of  the 
water  decided,  as  you  know,  to  let  our  current  English 
version  here  remain  unchanged.  The  independence  and 
thoroughness  of  his  investigations,  the  reiterated  consider- 
ation he  gave  his  problem  before  publishing  the  solution 
which  seemed  to  him  satisfactory,  rendered  him  tenacious 
of  his  conclusions.  That  they  might  not  commend  them- 
selves at  sight  to  the  majority  even  of  students  did  not 
disturb  him.  But  when  an  expert,  by  independent  study, 
reached  an  opposite  result, —  as,  for  example,  in  the  case 
just  mentioned, —  he  at  once  reopened  for  himself  the 
problem  and  set  on  foot  researches  with  a  view  to  settle 
the  obscure  or  variable  factors  in  the  evidence,  that,  if 
possible,  he  might  win  for  his  argument  the  only  satisfac- 
tory token  of  conclusiveness ;  namely,  the  conversion  of  him 
that  is  of  the  contrary  part. 

But  it  is  of  the  character  of  his  work  rather  than  of  his 
conclusions  and  their  fate  that  I  would  speak.  The  perusal 
of  one  of  his  thorough  and  impartial  discussions  stirs  within 
the  reader  an  impatient  craving  for  more  work  from  him 
of  the  same  sort.  It  is  not  probable  that  any  new  manu- 
script evidence  will  come  to  light  of  such  a  nature  as  to 
change  in  any  important  passage  the  concurrent  decision  of 
critics  of  the  school  of  Tischendorf,  Tregelles,  Westcott  and 
Hort.  It  would  be  an  immense  benefaction,  therefore,  if 
a  student  could  have  a  complete  and  trustworthy  statement 
of  the  present  state  of  the  facts  in  reference  to  passages 
still  under  debate.  Such^i  impartial  and  exhaustive  ex- 
hibition, even  when  it  did  not  go  far  toward  closing  the 
discussion,  would  be  invaluable  as  a  basis  for  further  study. 
A  service  of  this  sort,  it  is  known  possibly  to  some  of  you, 
Dr.  Abbot  had  hoped  to  render  in  a  series  of  essays  to  be 
appended  to  a  manual  edition  of  the  Greek  text.  But  the 
execution  of  the  project  was  indefinitely  postponed,  partly 
on  account  of  the  engrossing  character  of  the  work  contrib- 
uted by  him  to  the  Prolegomena  of  Tischendorf's  larger 
edition,  and  partly  in  consequence  of  the  appearance  of 


41 

Westcott  and  Hort's  text  and  the  turn  which  that  has  given, 
for  the  time  to  critical  discussion. 

In  what  is  known  as  the  department  of  "  Higher  Criti- 
cism," Dr.  Abbot  published  but  a  single  essay, —  one,  but 
a  lion.  It  was  originally  read,  in  part,  at  a  public  meeting 
of  the  "  Ministers'  Institute,"  held  in  Providence,  R.I.,  in 
October,  1879,  and  is  devoted  to  discussing  "a  few  important 
points  "  only,  in  the  external  evidences  for  the  genuineness 
of  the  Gospel  ascribed  to  John.  The  selection  of  the 
points  and  the  handling  of  them  were  largely  governed 
by  the  anonymous  work  entitled  Supernatural  Religion, 
which  had  reached  a  seventh  edition  that  year.  A  review 
of  the  discussion  cannot  be  given  here.  Suffice  it  to  say 
that  for  learning,  for  caution,  for  candor,  and  —  I  am  ready 
to  add  —  for  conclusiveness,  it  is  unsurpassed  by  anything 
which  the  protracted  controversy  over  the  Fourth  Gospel 
has  produced  on  either  side  of  the  water.  As  respects  its 
main  object,  it  is,  I  think,  as  decisive  a  piece  of  reasoning 
as  Baur's  famous  essay  to  prove  the  unity  of  the  Gospel. 
That  object  is  not  to  show  that  Justin  held  the  "modern 
Orthodox  faith  "  respecting  the  "inspired  authority"  of  the 
Gospel, —  strange  misconception, —  but  to  throw  some  light 
upon  the  question  whether  the  apostolical  memoirs  to 
which  Justin  Martyr  appeals  about  the  middle  of  the  second 
century  were  or  were  not  our  four  Gospels.  "To  throw 
some  light"  upon  it,  I  say,  not  to  discuss  it  fully, —  for  even 
that  would  require  a  volume,  as  Dr.  Abbot  states, —  but  to 
show  the  falsity  of  the  reasonings  by  which  the  author  of 
Supernatural  Religion  and  those  who  agree  with  him  attempt 
to  uphold  the  contrary  opinion.  The  subject  of  Justin's  quo- 
tations has  already  been  ably  discussed  by  Norton,  Semisch, 
Westcott,  Drummond,  and  others ;  but,  for  lucidity  and 
neatness  of  execution,  Dr.  Abbot's  essay  has  never  been 
surpassed,  while,  for  learned  research,  it  makes  a  distinct 
addition  to  the  work  of  his  predecessors. 

And  the  argument  throughout  is  characterized  by  a  clear- 
headed good  sense,  which,  alas !  is  sometimes  missed  in 


42 

productions  exhibiting  no  mean  learning.  Nothing  can  well 
be  more  felicitous  or  conclusive  than  the  way  in  which  — 
after  a  detailed  exposition  of  the  fallacy  of  the  common 
assumption  that,  because  Justin's  quotation  of  our  Lord's 
words  respecting  the  new  birth  differs  from  the  exact 
language  as  given  in  John  it  cannot  have  been  derived 
from  that  Gospel  —  he  clinches  his  argument  by  adducing 
nine  quotations  of  the  passage  by  Jeremy  Taylor,  which 
exemplify  all  the  peculiarities  of  variation  from  the  common 
text  on  which  the  writers  of  the  Tubingen  school  have  laid 
such  stress,  and  which,  by  parity  of  reasoning,  prove  that 
the  eminent  English  divine  must  have  used  many  apocryphal 
Gospels. 

The  essay  was  republished,  I  believe,  in  England ;  and 
the  commendation  it  called  forth  from  specialists  was  abun- 
dant and  emphatic.  Prof.  Mangold  of  Bonn,  for  instance, 
although  he  stands  openly  among  those  who  oppose  the 
genuineness  of  the  Gospel,  says,  in  a  review  of  Dr.  Abbot's 
essay,*  "Abbot  has  accomplished  (in  the  reviewer's  opinion) 
the  main  task  of  his  (second)  inquiry.  That  Justin  knew 
and  used  the  Fourth  Gospel  is  established ;  also,  that  he 
employed  it  as  being  in  his  view  a  genuine  writing  of  the 
apostle  John."  .  .  . 

Let  me  quote  a  few  additional  sentences  from  another 
notice  of  the  essay  by  a  German  professor  (Beweis  des 
Glaubens  for  1881,  p.  94  seq.).  The  reviewer  remarks  :  "  The 
unfounded,  crude,  and  hasty  character  of  his  opponent's 
representations  is  triumphantly  exposed,  with  a  rare  wealth 
of  patristic  learning  and  an  expert's  familiarity  with  the 
recent  literature.  The  manner  in  which  he  demonstrates, 
both  from  the  ecclesiastical  and  the  gnostic  writers  of  the 
second  century,  that  the  genuineness  of  John's  Gospel  is 
universally  acknowledged, —  is  established  beyond  contra- 
diction in  the  conviction  of  the  Church  of  that  period, —  has 
an  effect  quite  overpowering."  In  relation  to  Justin's  quo- 
tation, the  essay  is  declared  to  "  give  evidence  of  remarkable 
acuteness  and  a  thoroughly  sound  judgment "  ;  and  the 

*See  Getting isc he gelehrte  Anzeigen  (Stiick  i,  2,  p.  48),  January,  1881. 


43 

notice  closes  with  the  hope  that  this  "  robust  scholarship 
may  give  birth  to  many  other  offspring,  characterized  by 
the  like  fulness  of  maturity  and  consummate  beauty  of 
form." 

Dr.  Abbot  knew  —  no  man  knew  better  —  that  the  last 
word  in  the  debate  respecting  the  genuineness  of  this 
Gospel  has  not  yet  been  spoken.  Indeed,  he  says  :  "  To 
treat  the  historical  evidence  with  any  thoroughness  would 
require  a  volume ;  to  discuss  the  internal  character  of  the 
Gospel  in  its  bearings  on  the  question  of  its  genuineness 
and  historical  value,  would  require  a  much  larger  one."  Of 
the  first  volume,  he  has  given  us  but  a  fragment ;  of  the 
second,  he  has  left,  I  am  sorry  to  believe,  not  a  line. 

Not  to  dwell  upon  other  services  rendered  by  him  to  the 
cause  of  Biblical  criticism, —  as  in  the  revision  and  com- 
pletion of  Hudson's  Concordance,  and  in  the  assistance  given 
to  the  authors  of  Mitchell's  Critical  Handbook  and  Schaff's 
Companion,  etc.  (works  which  owe  a  large  part  of  their 
fulness  and  accuracy  in  the  treatment  of  the  history  of  the 
New  Testament  text  to  his  vigilant  supervision), —  special 
mention  must  be  made  of  the  fact  that  his  chief  labor  for 
years  past  has  been  expended  on  that  monumental  work 
the  first  half  of  which  is  now  receiving  the  enthusiastic 
welcome  of  scholars, —  the  Prolegomena,  namely,  to  the 
eighth  edition  of  Tischendorf's  larger  Greek  Testament. 

So  delicate  was  the  task  of  preparing  it,  and  so  scanty 
the  materials  for  the  purpose  left  by  Prof.  Tischendorf  at 
his  death,  that  for  a  year  and  a  half  his  literary  executors 
endeavored  in  vain  to  find  some  German  scholar  at  once 
competent  and  willing  to  undertake  the  work.  At  length, 
an  adventurous  young  American  studying  in  Leipzig  was 
persuaded  to  take  charge  of  the  enterprise,  emboldened 
thereto  by  the  promised  assistance  of  Dr.  Abbot,  who  had 
previously  declined  the  honor  of  acting  as  primary.  The 
consummate  industry  and  skill  exhibited  in  the  portion  just 
published  have  caused  him  to  be  created  a  Licentiate  of 
Theology  for  honor ;  and  to  receive  the  unusual,  if  not  quite 
unprecedented,  distinction,  for  a  native  of  this  country,  of 


44 

having  his  name  enrolled  among  the  teaching  staff  of  the 
University  of  Leipzig.  Yet  this  indefatigable  and  successful 
young  scholar  would  derive  as  much  pleasure  as  any  of 
us  from  the  acknowledgment  that  no  small  part  of  the 
surpassing  excellence  of  the  work  is  due  to  the  departed 
one,  whose  name  he  has  justly  associated  with  his  own  upon 
its  title-page.  Every  page  of  it  passed  under  his  critical 
eye,  both  in  manuscript  and  in  proof.  During  the  last 
seven  years  of  his  life,  he  gave  to  it,  and  to  the  portion 
yet  to  be  published,  unstinted  labor.  For  it  all  he  neither 
received  nor  desired  compensation.  Nay,  out  of  his  limited 
private  resources,  he  contributed  hundreds  of  dollars 
toward  defraying  the  frugal  expenses  of  his  fellow-laborer; 
and  he  devoted  almost  his  last  hours  to  preparing  and 
sending  out — as  he  had  done  once  and  again  before  —  an 
appeal  to  the  friends  of  sacred  literature  for  funds  to  enable 
Dr.  Gregory,  who  probably  has  a  better  acquaintance  with 
New  Testament  palaeography  than  any  other  man  living, 
by  personally  inspecting  the  manuscripts  of  Europe  and  the 
East,  to  give  that  account  of  th.e  contents  and  value  of  the 
hundreds  of  minor  authorities  which  the  labors  of  all  his 
predecessors  have  failed  to  furnish  and  which  the  students 
of  New  Testament  criticism  are  impatient  to  receive. 

More  helpful,  to  the  majority  of  students,  probably,  than 
Prof.  Abbot's  critical  labors,  were  his  bibliographical. 

His  first  publication  of  this  class,  however,  printed  more 
than  thirty  years  ago  (1853),  was  not  intended  for  general 
circulation.  It  is  a  volume  of  less  than  two  hundred  and 
fifty  octavo  pages,  containing  a  catalogue  of  the  Library 
(which  consisted  at  that  time  of  about  sixteen  hundred 
volumes)  belonging  to  the  High  School  of  this  city,  with 
which  school,  when  he  began  to  prepare  the  work,  he  was 
connected  as  a  teacher.  It  is 'primarily  a  subject-catalogue, 
the  subjects  being  distributed,  according  to  their  philo- 
sophical or  scientific  relations,  into  thirty-one  classes,  several 
of  which  have  in  turn  numerous  subdivisions,  and  in  all 
of  which  the  entries  are  alphabetical.  The  preface  gives 


45 

evidence  that  the  delicate  and  complicated  subject  of  cata- 
loguing, so  far  as  it  was  at  that  time  understood,  had  been 
thoroughly  studied  by  him.  It  was  no  mechanical  list  of 
titles  which  he  prepared ;  but  he  was  governed  in  his  work 
by  an  educative  aim,  which  the  very  moderate  size  of  the 
collection  enabled  him  to  carry  out,  even  as  the  inexperience 
of  those  for  whom  the  catalogue  was  prepared  made  it  of 
chief  moment.  "It  is  hoped,"  he  remarks,  "that  the  use 
of  a  classed  catalogue  may  promote  the  formation  of  those 
habits  of  investigation  and  research  which  are  essential  to 
success  in  the  pursuit  of  truth.  .  .  .  When  the  curiosity  of 
the  student  is  excited,  it  is  most  desirable  that  he  should 
have  every  facility  for  pursuing  the  inquiries  to  which  he  is 
led,  that  he  may  thus  be  encouraged  to  examine  and  think 
for  himself." 

It  is  not  difficult  for  one  who  inspects  this  thorough  piece 
of  work  to  trace  many  features  of  the  system  which,  some 
five  years  later,  Dr.  Abbot  devised  for  our  University 
Library  (to  the  staff  of  which  he  had  in  the  interim  been 
added),  and  which,  by  the  introduction  into  the  card  cata- 
logue of  an  ingenious  combination  of  the  classed  or  scientific 
and  the  alphabetical  arrangement,  "gave,"  as  an  adept  has 
said,  "  to  Harvard  College  Library  the  first  plan  ever  made 
for  a  complete  alphabetical  catalogue."  * 

His  next  publication  in  this  department  was  a  work  of 
far  more  general  and  permanent  interest.  It  appeared  at 
first  (in  1864)!  as  an  appendix  to  Mr.  Alger's  History  of  the 
Doctrine  of  the  Future  Life,  and  was  subsequently  issued 
separately.  It  is  a  classified  and  chronological  Catalogue 
of  Works  relating  to  the  Nature,  Origin,  and  Destiny  of  the 
Soul,  provided  with  notes  and  alphabetical  indexes :  two 
appendixes  give  titles  of  the  more  remarkable  works  relating 
to  Modern  Spiritualism  and  to  the  Souls  of  Brutes. 

*  Mr.  Cutter,  in  the  Report  of  the  Bureau  of  Education,  on  the  "  Public  Libraries  in  the 
United  States,"  p.  540. 

tDr.  Abbot's  Preface  is  dated  Jan.  i,  1862,  but  Mr.  Alger's  book  is  believed  to  have  been 
printed  and  ready  for  publication  in  January,  1859.  It  is  reviewed  at  length  —  and  the  bibliog- 
raphy also  !  —  in  the  Christian  Examiner  for  January,  1861.  There  is  reason  to  fear,  too,  that 
in  giving  the  year  1864  upon  the  title-page,  the  publishers  allowed  themselves  to  follow  the 
pernicious  practice  of  post-dating  a  book  which  was  actually  put  on  sale  two  or  three  months 
earlier,  if  we  may  judge  from  the  notices  of  it  to  be  found  in  the  journals  for  November  and 
December  of  the  preceding  year. 


46 

The  preparation  of  it  was  a  task  which  he  at  first  supposed 
he  could  despatch  "in  three  or  four  months,"  but  which  in 
the  end  occupied  more  than  three  years.  In  the  prosecution 
of  it,  he  explored  not  only  the  various  public  and  several 
private  libraries  of  this  vicinity,  but  spent  a  number  of  days 
at  the  Astor  Library  in  New  York,  and  even  ransacked  the 
collection  of  a  leading  antiquarian  bookseller,  who  had  for 
many  years  made  a  specialty  of  works  on  the  immortality 
of  the  soul.  And  deeming  it,  as  usual,  of  great  importance 
to  speak  as  far  as  possible  from  actual  inspection  of  the 
works  noted,  he  sent  to  Europe  for  several  of  special  rarity 
and  value,  as  he  did  when  engaged  in  another  biblio- 
graphical labor  soon  to  be  mentioned. 

Some  idea  of  the  extent  of  this  catalogue  may  be  gained 
from  the  fact  that  the  most  comprehensive  work  of  the  kind 
previously  extant  —  namely,  the  Bibliotheca  Psychologica  pub- 
lished in  1845  by  the  distinguished  bibliographer,  Grasse  — 
contains  only  about  ten  hundred  and  twenty-five  of  the  more 
than  five  thousand  three  hundred  titles  given  by  Dr.  Abbot. 

And  the  scrupulous  pains  expended  on  it  is  as  noticeable 
as  its  compass.  The  very  orthography  and  punctuation  no 
less  than  the  language  of  the  titles  have  been  preserved  ;  and, 
besides  the  place  and  date  of  publication,  we  have  given 
to  us  the  size  of  the  book,  the  standing  of  its  author,  the 
date  at  which  he  flourished,  and  the  place  where  his  work 
may  now  be  consulted,  so  far  as  the  contents  of  ten  Ameri- 
can collections  and  two  English  libraries  (the  Bodleian  and 
the  British  Museum)  are  concerned.  But  most  interesting 
of  all  are  the  brief  notes,  to  be  found  on  every  page, 
and  containing  choice  bits  of  pertinent  bibliographical, 
literary,  religious,  and  historical  knowledge.  The  book  in 
short  affords  a  succinct  history  of  opinion  on  the  important 
topic  to  which  it  relates,  and  is  indispensable  to  one  who 
wishes  to  study  that  subject  in  any  of  its  bearings.  A  man 
so  thoroughly  versed  in  such  matters  as  Mr.  Allibone,  after 
having  read  it  through  from  the  first  title  to  the  last, 
pronounced  it  "one  of  the  marvels  of  bibliography."  And 
the  characteristics  of  the  author,  as  disclosed  by  it,  almost 


47 

justify  the  description  of  him  given  by  a  reviewer  at  the 
time  as  "a  gentleman  of  miraculous  perseverance,  astute- 
ness, and  accuracy"  (Christian  Examiner  for  1861,  page  27). 

Dr.  Abbot's  third  great  bibliographical  labor,  though 
from  its  nature  lacking  the  symmetry  and  completeness 
which  characterize  the  model  work  just  described,  is  ser- 
viceable to  a  far  larger  number  of  students, —  in  fact,  to 
every  one  in  this  country  who  takes  interest  in  Biblical 
studies.  I  allude,  of  course,  to  the  editorial  additions 
which  he,  in  conjunction  with  the  late  Prof.  H.  B.  Hackett, 
contributed  to  Smith's  Dictionary  of  the  Bible. 

Of  the  more  than  thirteen  hundred  additions  *  with  which, 
according  to  a  hasty  count,  the  American  edition  has  been 
enriched,  upwards  of  a  thousand  bear  the  initials  of  the 
American  editors,  of  which  more  than  four  hundred  were 
from  the  pen  of  Dr.  Abbot.  Many  of  them,  to  be  sure, 
are  devoted  to  correcting  oversights,  supplying  omissions, 
supplementing  information, —  a  kind  of  work  making  com- 
paratively little  show,  but  for  which  a  student  or  a  teacher 
who  wishes  trustworthy  statements  is  often  inexpressibly 
grateful.  To  get  an  impression  of  the  delicate,  vigilant, 
scholarly  character  of  this  kind  of  revision,  the  admirable 
article  on  the  New  Testament  may  be  consulted  (an 
article  covering  more  than  thirty  double-columned  pages), 
or  that  upon  the  Septuagint,  or  upon  the  Authorized  Ver- 
sion, or  upon  the  Gospel  of  John.  This  last-named  article 
also,  with  its  more  than  two  pages  of  added  references  to 
literature,  affords  a  good  specimen  of  the  bibliographical 
enrichment  for  which  the  work  is  indebted  to  our  friend. 
The  like  may  be  found  under  the  head  of  "  Gospels,"  and 
to  some  extent  under  every  one  of  the  several  Biblical 
books ;  while  such  articles  as  "  Demon,"  "  Demoniacs," 
"  Messiah,"  and  those  on  the  various  apocryphal  books, 
show  by  the  comments  with  which  the  added  titles  are 
interspersed  that  the  writer  has  subjected  those  subjects 
to  special  and  independent  study. 

In  brief,  to  the  careful  scholarship  of  these  two  American 

*  Of  course  not  all  separate  articles. 


48 

Professors  we  are  indebted  for  what  is  unquestionably  the 
most  accurate  and  serviceable  work  of  its  kind  for  the  gen- 
eral student  in  any  tongue.  Moreover,  to  Dr.  Abbot's 
special  vigilance  in  reading  every  one  of  the  3652  pages  in 
proof,  the  exceptional  typographical  accuracy  of  the  work 
is  largely  due.  He  also  greatly  augmented  its  serviceable- 
ness  by  appending  an  index  of  the  principal  passages  of 
Scripture  illustrated,  as  well  as  by  multiplying  cross- 
references. 

I  have  dwelt  so  long  upon  Dr.  Abbot's  pre-eminent  ser- 
vices as  a  textual  critic  and  bibliographer  that  perhaps  some 
persons  may  infer  that  he  was  a  mere  specialist,  a  man 
thoroughly  versed  in  one  or  two  narrow  departments  of 
knowledge,  but  acquainted  with  little  besides.  The  in- 
ference would  do  him  great  injustice.  He  was  well  aware, 
indeed,  of  the  necessity  of  concentration  as  the  condition 
of  valuable  achievement  ;  used  to  deplore  the  current  pro- 
pensity among  workers  in  the  realm  of  thought,  as  in  the 
world  of  things,  to  attach  more  value  to  quantity  of  produc- 
tion than  to  quality.  Hence,  he  did  not  cultivate  the  foible 
of  omniscience.  And  he  became  so  noted  for  his  attain- 
ments in  the  particular  and  somewhat  recondite  branches 
of  learning  to  which  his  best  known  publications  relate  that 
his  broad  general  scholarship  was  often  overlooked.  But 
he  took  a  lively  interest  his  life  long  in  many  departments 
of  thought  with  which  his  name  is  seldom  associated.  As 
a  boy,  he  surprised  one  evening  his  companions  in  the  little 
local  lyceum  by  reading  them  a  poem  of  his  own  composi- 
tion ;  and  in  religious  poetry,  especially,  he  was  a  connois- 
seur. His  youthful  interest  in  wild  flowers  he  never  out- 
grew ;  and  he  delighted  to  make  excursions  for  them,  and  to 
replenish  the  little  nursery  of  them  which  he  successfully 
kept  up  in  the  corner  of  his  grounds.  His  enthusiasm  over 
the  starry  heavens  was  so  great  as,  in  the  language  of  an 
early  friend,  to  take  the  chill  off  the  air  of  a  winter  night. 
Good  books  of  every  sort  he  was  a  genuine  lover  of.  And 
the  choice  collection  he  has  gathered  give  abundant 


49 

evidence  of  having  been  intelligently  used.  Many  of  his 
intimates,  even,  seem  not  to  be  aware  of  the  fact  that  to 
him  we  are  indebted  for  what  are  probably  the  most  accurate 
editions  extant  of  Jeremy  Taylor's  Holy  Living  and  Holy 
Dying,  the  text  of  Pickering's  edition  having  been  carefully 
revised  and  corrected,  and  the  numerous  quotations  from 
ancient  authors  verified  and  referred  to  their  sources.  The 
purchase  of  a  rare  edition,  the  appearance  of  a  new  and 
attractive  manual,  though  it  were  but  a  Hebrew  grammar, 
would  prompt  him  to  take  up  a  study  anew.  "  Oh  that  I 
were  only  thirty  years  old  !  "  he  exclaimed,  on  hearing  that 
a  rudimentary  work  in  Assyriology  was  announced  for  pub- 
lication ;  "  for  it  seems  as  though  a  student  might  get  a 
tolerable  mastery  of  a  science  lying  as  yet  in  so  narrow 
compass,  and  then  keep  pace  with  its  growth."  The  unex- 
plored fields  of  knowledge,  whether  in  the  intellectual  realm 
or  the  physical,  piqued  his  curiosity ;  and  he  was  impatient 
at  any  apparent  indifference  or  timidity  on  the  part  of  those 
responsible  for  research.  Though  removed  as  far  as  possi- 
ble alike  by  constitution  and  by  mental  habit  from  every- 
thing visionary  or  whimsical,  he  was  outspoken  in  the 
opinion  that  the  alleged  phenomena  of  Spiritualism  (for 
instance)  have  not  yet  received  from  physicists  due  scrutiny, 
whether  we  consider  the  accumulated  testimony  of  credible 
witnesses  on  the  one  hand,  or  have  regard  for  the  public 
welfare  on  the  other.  The  terrific  tortures  inflicted  by  stub- 
born unbelievers  in  the  insensibility  of  somnambulists  ;  the 
easy-going  incredulity  of  conceited  scientists,  who  exclaim 
"  Impossible !"  and  turn  away  in  contempt  from  phenomena 
which  call  for  serious  study  ;  the  indifference  of  the  great 
majority  to  the  same  until  they  reappear  perhaps  a  genera- 
tion or  two  later  under  some  foreign  indorsement, —  humili- 
ating facts  like  these  in  the  history  of  science  were  often 
adduced  by  him  in  proof  of  the  truth  that  bigotry  and  nar- 
rowness and  barbarity  are  not  the  exclusive  prerogatives  of 
theologians. 

In  short,  when  you  had  once  convinced  him  that  you  were 
not  consulting  him  as  an  authority  on  any  given  subject, 


50 

you  could  be  pretty  sure  of  eliciting  from  him  precious 
information  concerning  it.  On  the  other  hand,  it  was 
amusing  sometimes  to  see  an  inquirer,  thinking  to  use  him 
as  you  would  a  dictionary,  put  to  him  a  question  in  the  hope 
of  running  off  at  once  with  an  answer  in  a  single  sentence, 
and  receive  an  elaborate  exposition  of  his  problem  in  its 
causes,  origin,  relations,  suggestions,  which  convinced  the 
luckless  questioner  that  there  are  more  things  in  heaven 
and  earth  than  he  ever  dreamed  of. 

Other  particulars  of  Dr.  Abbot's  life  and  services  I  must 
content  myself  with  little  more  than  an  allusion  to. 

Not  all  his  work  was  done  for  scholars  or  was  concerned 
exclusively  with  the  intellectiial  aspects  and  relations  of 
truth.  For  a  series  of  years,  he  was  an  efficient  teacher  in 
the  Sunday-school  connected  with  this  church,*  and  gave 
to  the  work  much  more  time  than  what  was  needed  for 
preparation  for  the  weekly  hour  with  his  class.  That  class 
was  equipped  with  copies  of  the  New  Testament  in  several 
tongues,  with  note-books  and  the  various  helps  by  which  he 
knew  so  well  how  to  lead  pupils  to  look  at  a  subject 
thoughtfully  and  on  all  sides.  Many  a  careful  and  some- 
times extended  paper  would  he  write  out  at  home  in  answer 
to  some  question  which  he  could  not  satisfactorily  dispose 
of  on  the  spot.  And,  by  the  way,  it  was  in  this  school 
that,  if  tradition  is  to  be  trusted,  he  was  once  covered  with 
confusion  in  consequence  of  his  inability  to  answer  a  ques- 
tion. One  morning,  so  the  story  runs,  before  the  opening 
of  the  session,  while  many  were  standing  around,  he  was 
asked  by  a  professional  man  "who  was  to  preach  that 
day."  He  replied  that  he  did  not  know,  and  was  over- 
whelmed by  the  rejoinder,  "Good!  I  am  glad  at  length  to 
have  discovered  something  that  you  do  not  know."  His 
interest  in  the  school  did  not  terminate  when  his  health 
compelled  him  to  end  his  active  connection  with  it.  Indeed, 
the  last  bibliographical  work  of  his  life,  I  believe,  was  done 
upon  the  catalogue  of  its  library. 

*This  address  was  delivered  in  the  church  of  the  First  Parish  in  Cambridge. 


Of  Dr.  Abbot's  personal  worth  and  Christian  character, 
any  one  who  knew  him  may  safely  be  called  upon  to  speak. 
He  regarded  himself  as  constitutionally  hasty,  but  his  friends 
never  discovered  the  infirmity.  His  amiability  and  sweet- 
ness were  equal  to  his  scholarly  unselfishness  and  his  mod- 
esty ;  and  all,  I  believe,  were  unsurpassed.  His  guileless 
and  outspoken  language  in  controversial  discussion  pro- 
voked, on  two  or  three  occasions,  the  animadversion  of  his 
opponents.  But  these  strictures  called  out  from  him  in- 
stantly such  explanations  and  regrets  as  more  than  effaced 
the  misjudgment.  In  one  of  the  most  recent  instances 
where  his  tone  in  controversy  is  sharply  censured  in  a  work 
of  extensive  use  in  scholarly  circles,  the  author  subsequently, 
in  a  private  letter,  confesses  himself  "unfeignedly  sorry," 
"asks  [Dr.  Abbot's]  forgiveness,"  and  promises  "to  take  an 
early  opportunity  of  unsaying  his  words." 

Respecting  his  religious  belief,  I  am  going  to  venture  to 
let  him  speak  for  himself,  merely  premising,  by  way  of 
explanation,  that  in  recent  years  he  has  often  admitted 
me  into  his  counsels  and  placed  in  my  hands  the  extended 
letters  with  which  he  not  infrequently  favored  his  corre- 
spondents. One  of  these  correspondents  across  the  water, 
on  receiving  from  Dr.  Abbot  some  spontaneous  suggestions 
on  matters  of  criticism  touched  upon  in  a  book  he  had  just 
published,  desired  in  his  reply  to  know  something  more  of 
our  friend's  position  and  calling,  adding  that  he  knew  simply 
from  the  D.D.  which  he  had  somewhere  seen  attached  to  his 
name  that  he  was  by  profession  a  clergyman.  In  response 
to  this  desire,  Dr.  Abbot  wrote  the  sentences  which  I  am 
about  to  quote.  I  ought  to  apologize,  perhaps,  for  giving 
them  publicity.  In  fact,  I  should  have  been  at  a  loss  until 
this  hour  to  explain  how  it  was  that  I  took  the  wholly  excep- 
tional liberty  of  extracting  them.  But  something  about 
them  impressed  me,  as  I  trust  it  will  impress  you ;  and,  on 
this  occasion,  something  surely  will  be  pardoned  to  the  spirit 
of  admiring  friendship. 

Dr.  Abbot  writes  (under  date  of  Oct.  22,  1882) :  "I  am  not 
one  of  those  who  deem  it  of  little  importance  what  a  man 


52 

believes ;  but  it  seems  to  me  that  the  power  of  religion  over 
the  heart  and  life  depends  far  more  on  the  earnestness  and 
depth  of  conviction  with  which  a  few  sublime  truths  are 
held  fast  than  on  the  length  of  the  creed.  I  am  a  layman, 
and  have  not  had  the  advantage  of  instruction  in  any  theo- 
logical school ;  but  I  have  been  interested  from  my  youth  in 
the  study  of  theology,  simply  because  it  seemed  to  me  to 
embrace  the  subjects  of  deepest  interest  to  man,  to  occupy 
itself  with  the  very  highest  objects  of  human  thought. 

"  So  far  as  I  know  my  own  heart,  I  have  studied  the  New 
Testament  and  the  early  Christian  writings,  as  well  as  those 
of  modern  theologians,  with  an  earnest  desire  to  ascertain 
the  truth.  In  pursuing  my  inquiries,  I  have  always  endeav- 
ored to  make  myself  familiar  with  the  writings  of  the  ablest 
exponents  of  conflicting  opinions,  especially  of  opinions 
opposed  to  those  toward  which  I  felt  myself  inclining,  and 
have  tried  to  estimate  fairly  the  force  of  their  arguments. 
While  I  have  always,  as  far  as  possible,  gone  to  the  original 
sources,  and  followed  Dr.  Routh's  excellent  maxim  of  verify- 
ing references,  I  have  read  Pearson  and  Bull,  Grabe  and 
Waterland,  quite  as  carefully  as  Whiston  and  Whitby,  Clarke 
and  Jackson ;  Meier  and  Dorner  as  faithfully  as  Martini  and 
Baur ;  Pye  Smith  and  Stuart  and  Canon  Liddon,  as  well  as 
Belsham  and  Channing  and  Norton. 

"  I  believe  with  all  my  heart  in  the  divine  origin  of  Chris- 
tianity,—  that  the  revelation  of  God  in  Jesus  Christ  is  the 
event  in  human  history  which  immeasurably  transcends  all 
others  in  importance.  In  him  and  him  alone  do  I  find  God 
fully  revealed  as  the  Father  of  all ;  in  him  and  him  alone  do 
I  find  fully  realized  on  earth  the  divine  life,  the  life  of  union 
with  God,  which  constitutes  the  ideal  of  humanity.  In  his 
teaching  concerning  God  and  man,  in  the  inspiration  which 
flows  from  his  life  and  death  of  self-sacrificing  love,  and  in 
his  manifestation  of  the  love  and  mercy  of  God,  I  find  the 
highest  conceivable  motives  to  a  life  of  holiness,  of  absolute 
consecration  to  God  and  the  service  of  humanity.  In  these 
days,  when  the  thick  darkness  of  a  dreary  scepticism  over- 
shadows so  many  minds,  leaving  no  object  of  worship,  of 


53 

supreme  love  and  gratitude  and  devotion,  and  no  hope  of  a 
life  beyond  the  grave,  I  am  impressed  most  deeply  with  the 
surpassing  grandeur  and  inestimable  value  of  the  great 
truths  which  all  disciples  of  Christ,  of  whatever  name,  hold 
in  common ;  and  I  can  only  lament  the  fact  that  speculative 
differences  on  questions  interesting  indeed,  but  compara- 
tively unimportant,  some  of  them  on  subjects  which  tran- 
scend the  powers  of  the  human  mind,  should  break  the  bond 
of  brotherly  affection  and  sympathy  which  ought  to  bind 
together  all  who  acknowledge  Christ  as  their  Master,  and 
sincerely  strive  to  walk  in  his  steps." 

To  the  success  of  this  Christian's  endeavor  to  walk  in  his 
Master's  footsteps,  striking  testimony  has  been  given  within 
these  last  few  weeks.  Three*  separate  correspondents  have 
summed  up  their  estimate  of  the  man  as  follaws  :  "  I  have 
often  thought  and  sometimes  said  that  I  never  saw  any  one 
who  seemed  to  me  to  show  more  vividly  in  his  life  the  life 
of  Jesus  "  ;  "I  never  knew,"  writes  another,  "  I  never  knew 
a  man  more  Christlike  than  dear  Mr.  Abbot " ;  and  yet  once 
more,  "  He  translated  to  my  mind  the  character  of  Christ." 

What  grander  eulogy  could  be  desired  !  How  does  the 
glory  of  the  matchless  critic  and  bibliographer,  the  scru- 
pulous editor  and  reviser,  the  unrivalled  "  corrector  of  errors 
and  collector  of  facts,"  disappear  by  reason  of  that  glory 
which  excelleth !  The  glory  of  the  terrestrial  is  one,  the 
glory  of  the  celestial  is  another. 

When  we  consider  the  feeble  health  of  Dr.  Abbot,  and 
the  fact  that  it  was  only  during  the  last  twelve  years  of  his 
life  that  he  was  permitted  to  devote  himself  to  Biblical 
studies  as  his  main  business,  while  even  during  those  years 
he  was  adjusting  himself  to  the  demands  of  a  new  position 
and  was  giving  much  time  to  his  duties  as  a  member  of  the 
New  Testament  Revision  Company,  we  are  struck  with  his 
literary  productiveness.  His  writings  remain  to  stimulate 
to  diligence,  to  thoroughness,  to  candor,  to  unflinching 
loyalty  to  the  truth.  Nor  those  writings  alone  which  openly 
bear  his  name.  His  unstinted  generosity,  his  gratuitous 


54 

services, —  so  numerous  that  they  cannot  easily  be  reckoned 
up,  for  he  kept  no  record  of  them,  so  unobtrusive  that  often 
they  are  rather  to  be  suspected  than  demonstrated, —  have 
caused  him  to  enter  less  as  a  name  than  as  a  force  into  the 
Biblical  scholarship  of  recent  years.  As  with  the  dew  and 
the  light,  his  beneficent  working  is  misjudged,  if  its  results 
are  looked  for  in  isolated  and  palpable  products.  There  are 
scores  of  scholars,  I  verily  believe,  to-day  who  are  doing 
better  work  —  more  thorough  and  careful  and  conscien- 
tious—  because  Ezra  Abbot  has  lived.  There  are  scholars 
who  by  him  have  had  their  vision  opened  to  higher  fields 
of  investigation,  and  their  zeal  kindled  to  enter  upon  them. 

Has  his  influence  ended  ?  Is  it  to  be  restricted  to  the 
indirect  and  diffused  persuasiveness  of  a  mere  pattern  of 
scholarship,  incalculably  useful  though  that  be  ? 

For  one,  I  would  fain  hope  not.  A  review  of  his  life 
shows  us  what  a  blessing  was  conferred  upon  the  world 
when  he  was  made  a  scholar  instead  of  a  farmer.  All  honor 
to  the  discernment  of  those  who  rescued  him  for  Exeter  and 
Bowdoin  and  Cambridge  and  Christendom !  Thanks  and 
honor  to  those  who  opened  the  way  for  him  to  that  special 
department  of  study  for  which  his  exceptional  gifts  and  his 
personal  tastes  best  fitted  him !  Sir  Humphry  Davy,  you 
remember,  on  being  asked  which  of  his  discoveries  was  in 
his  judgment  the  greatest,  replied  Michael  Faraday. 

But  what  if  that  quarter  of  a  century  which  intervened 
between  Dr.  Abbot's  coming  to  Cambridge  and  his  taking 
his  seat  in  a  professor's  chair  had  been  given  without  dis- 
traction to  Biblical  studies !  We  should  not  to-day  be 
deploring  the  termination  of  a  career  just  as  it  was  reaching 
the  period  of  ripe  fruitage.  Our  bereavement  would  not 
get  additional  poignancy  from  the  spectacle  of  unfinished 
tasks  of  prime  importance  which  no  survivor  can  worthily 
take  up.  What  if  Mr.  Norton,  on  summoning  to  Cambridge 
the  young  stranger  who  wrote  him  that  memorable  letter, 
had  been  able  at  once  to  make  him  master  of  the  leisure  and 
the  books  necessary  for  the  prosecution  of  the  studies  for 
which  his  volunteer  researches  proved  him  to  have  rare  apti- 


55 

tude !  What  an  inestimable  gain,  if  our  friend  could  only 
have  given  himself  to  his  life's  work  wholly  and  on  the  spot, 
instead  of  squandering  his  precious  strength  and  mental 
powers  for  twenty-five  years  in  teaching  school  and  cata- 
loguing books ! 

Nay,  further:  after  the  Bussey  professorship  had  been 
created  for  Dr.  Abbot,  and  he  had  been  prevailed  upon  to 
assume  the  chair,  the  wasteful  expenditure  did  not  cease. 
It  took  on,  rather,  another  form.  To  a  mind  of  very  delicate 
adjustment,  quick  to  detect  differences  non-existent  to  the 
careless  perception,  seeing  significance  and  consequent 
importance  in  trivialities  which  the  ordinary  student  holds 
as  of  no  account,  coursing  to  and  fro  along  new  lines  of 
suggestion, —  to  a  mind  of  this  class,  the  work  of  teaching  is 
seldom  congenial.  To  compel  such  a  mind  to  plod  along  by 
the  side  of  an  average  understanding  is  like  "  making  a 
plough-horse  of  Pegasus."  Daily  —  perhaps  twice  a  day  — 
to  interrupt  the  studies  of  such  a  mind,  to  distract  its  atten- 
tion from  its  kindred  investigations,  to  force  it  to  expend  its 
nervous  energy  in  the  attempt  —  probably  futile,  possibly 
exasperating,  certainly  impoverishing  - — to  impart  its  life  to 
different  clay,  is  wasteful  prodigality. 

This  prodigal  expenditure  of  our  intellectual  resources  we 
are  used  to  in  this  country :  indeed,  it  is  almost  unavoidable 
in  the  earlier  stages  of  a  nation's  life.  But  it  is  far  more 
deplorable  than  the  burning  down  of  the  primeval  forests  by 
the  frontier  settler  that  he  may  clear  the  ground  for  his 
cabin  and  potato-patch.  Intelligent  educators  are  waking 
up  to  its  extravagance.  Dr.  Abbot's  career  is  a  most 
impressive  protest  against  it :  yes,  an  appeal  for  the  intro- 
duction of  a  different  system,  which  seems  to  me  to  be  more 
effective  than  a  volume  of  argument.  It  is  as  affording  the 
opportunity  of  seconding  that  appeal  that  this  hour,  I  confess, 
has  for  me  its  main  interest. 

Speaking  broadly,  there  may  be  said  to  be  three  depart- 
ments of  intellectual  activity  ;  namely,  the  increase  of  knowl- 
edge, the  formal  impartation  of  knowledge,  the  general 
diffusion  of  knowledge  among  the  multitude.  The  explorer, 


56 

the  teacher,  the  popular  writer  or  lecturer,  are  familiar 
representatives  of  these  three  distinct  functions  of  the 
intellectual  life.  Now,  it  is  coming  to  be  recognized  more 
and  more  that  these  three  functions  cannot  wisely  be  com- 
bined, that  division  of  labor  increases  efficiency  and  pro- 
motes productiveness  here  as  elsewhere.  The  Christian 
minister  of  to-day  does  not  undertake,  as  his  predecessor  did 
two  or  three  generations  ago,  to  turn  his  house  into  a  theo- 
logical seminary.  The  student  of  theology,  the  student  of 
medicine,  the  student  of  law,  nowadays  wisely  betakes 
himself  to  a  centre  where  he  can  come  under  the  influence 
of  specialists  whose  exclusive  business  it  is  to  teach. 

But  the  work  of  teaching  is  engrossing  and  exhausting : 
it  seldom  leaves  the  instructor  either  time  or  strength  for 
original  research.  Indeed,  that  man  passes  as  an  enter- 
prising teacher  who,  while  treading  year  after  year  his 
monotonous  round,  keeps  abreast  with  the  progress  of 
discovery  in  its  relation  to  his  own  department.  Only 
a  limited  acquaintance  with  the  career  of  noted  instructors 
will  enable  us  to  recall  one  man  and  another  from  whose 
hand  the  sceptre  has  departed  for  want  of  even  this  degree 
of  enterprise.  That  now  and  then  an  exception  should 
occur,  like  our  deceased  friend,  only  proves  the  contrary 
state  of  things  to  be  the  rule. 

One  of  his  acquaintances,  himself  a  prominent  New 
Testament  teacher  and  scholar,  in  a  letter  written  shortly 
after  Dr.  Abbot's  death,  utters  reflections  with  which  that 
event  has  burdened  many  a  lover  of  Biblical  learning.  "  It 
is  surprising,"  he  writes,  "it  is  surprising  and  strange, 
indeed,  that  such  a  man  should  have  been  left  in  the  position 
of  Assistant  Librarian  of  the  Athenaeum  and  Harvard  Col- 
lege Libraries  for  so  many  years.  .  .  .  What  a  pity  that,  to 
men  who  can  be  scholars  such  as  he  was,  the  colleges  and 
schools  offer  positions  only  as  working  teachers !  " 

Now,  the  obvious  remedy  for  this  grievous  evil  consists 
in  putting  men  of  the  sort  into  different  positions ;  and,  as 
such  positions  do  not  now  exist,  in  creating  such  positions, — 
in  creating  places  to  be  filled  by  men  whose  primary,  if  not 


57 

sole,  duty  it  shall  be  to  extend  the  boundaries  of  knowledge. 
Such  men.  furnished  already  with  the  present  results  of 
Biblical  scholarship,  should  make  it  the  business  of  their  life 
to  solve  some  of  the  many  and  multiplying  problems  of 
Biblical  science. 

Fellowships  we  now  have  (and  rejoice  in)  which  enable 
their  holders  to  prosecute  study  beyond  the  line  which 
marks  the  goal  of  the  average  student.  But  these  fellow- 
ships are  given  to  young  men,  whose  aim  is  not  to  increase 
the  common  stock  of  knowledge,  but  to  get  a  broader 
acquaintance  with  it ;  whose  destiny  it  is  not  to  become 
original  investigators  but  to  qualify  themselves  for  the 
teacher's  chair.  The  class  of  men  I  now  have  in  mind  are 
men  of  a  higher  grade  and  maturer  attainments,  men  who 
(if  possible)  shall  have  won  for  themselves  already  among 
experts  recognition  as  scholars,  and  whose  province  it  shall 
be  to  augment  the  store  of  knowledge  from  which  the 
teacher  draws  his  materials.  In  a  word,  is  it  not  time  that 
investigation  were  recognized  as  a  distinct  and  legitimate 
vocation  in  a  well-appointed  seat  of  learning  ? 

Even  in  the  older  countries  of  Europe,  where  the  univer- 
sities have  gathered  to  themselves  the  inheritance  of  centu- 
ries, where  it  is  an  acknowledged  duty  of  the  government  to 
promote  and  subsidize  learned  research,  and  where,  as  is 
the  case  particularly  in  England,  a  wealthy  and  well-manned 
religious  establishment  furnishes  many  a  post  of  com- 
parative leisure,  with  ample  facilities  for  study  at  hand, 
more  liberal  assistance  in  the  prosecution  of  original 
research  has  been  repeatedly  emphasized  of  late  as  one 
of  the  pressing  wants  of  the  period. 

Is  it  not  time  its  claims  in  the  department  of  theology 
met  with  recognition  on  this  side  of  the  water  ? 

Obviously,  from  its  very  nature,  the  vocation  can  never 
be  self-supporting.  Indeed,  even  the  work  of  teaching  is,  as 
we  know,  chiefly  dependent  for  its  maintenance  upon  State 
patronage  or  private  endowment.  But  the  investigator 
must  be  lifted  above  the  anxieties  and  interruptions  in- 
separable from  a  scanty  or  uncertain  provision  for  earthly 


58 

wants.  He  should  be  able,  in  addition,  to  command  every 
extant  facility  for  the  successful  prosecution  of  his  chosen 
task. 

And  I  need  not  remind  you  that  the  time  is  especially 
opportune  for  such  an  endowment  of  Biblical  research  as 
I  am  pleading  for.  The  dominion  of  purely  speculative 
theology  is  ended.  The  historic  sciences  and  historic 
methods  are  gaining  their  legitimate  supremacy.  The 
existing  unsettled  state  of  theological  opinion  is  due  in  no 
small  measure  to  the  working  of  the  historic  spirit.  The 
disfavor  with  which  even  dispassionate  and  conservative 
statements  of  the  results  of  historic  research  as  applied  to 
the  Scriptures  have  been  received  in  circles  which  have 
prided  themselves  on  their  enterprise  in  speculation  is  evi- 
dence of  the  prevalent  ignorance  of  the  Bible  as  an  historic 
book,  and  calls  for  the  increase  as  well  as  for  the  dissemina- 
tion of  knowledge.  The  teachers  themselves  have  need  of 
being  taught  in  this  matter.  And  who  can  overlook  the 
new  field  for  exploration,  full  of  promise  for  Biblical  history, 
antiquities,  philology,  which  the  rising  Oriental  studies  are 
opening  ?  Indeed,  the  experts  tell  us  that  there  is  not  even 
a  satisfactory  Hebrew  lexicon  extant,  notwithstanding  the 
recent  multiplication  of  manuals  ;  and  New  Testament  lexi- 
cography, although  in  a  better  condition,  looks  forward 
with  expectancy  to  the  results  of  the  years  of  research 
devoted  to  the  Septuagint  and  later  Greek  by  the  corps  of 
explorers  now  supported  by  the  munificence  of  the  Clar- 
endon Press.  Shall  America  have  no  other  part  in  these 
beneficent  researches  than  that  taken  by  some  hard-worked 
professor  who,  like  our  lamented  friend,  does  the  work  of 
two,  and  prosecutes  researches  at  his  own  charges  ? 

Do  you  tell  me  of  the  light  esteem  in  which  theology  is 
held  in  these  days  ?  But  a  profession  is  respected  that 
makes  itself  respectable.  Not  the  least  of  the  inestimable 
benefactions  which  Ezra  Abbot  conferred  upon  this  our 
University  consisted  in  going  in  and  out  here  as  a  living 
witness  that  Christian  theology  has  valid  claims  upon  the 
largest  learning  and  the  keenest  intellect,  is  entitled  to  the 


59 

most  absorbing  allegiance  of  head  and  heart  and  life  of  the 
noblest  and  most  gifted  of  men.  Should  he,  perchance, 
have  been  occasionally  without  due  honor  among  his  own 
literary  household,  he  has  done  much  to  render  Harvard 
University  better  known  and  more  highly  esteemed  abroad. 
His  neighbors,  even,  may  have  known  him  only  by  sight ; 
but  there  is  mourning  because  of  him  in  the  high  places  of 
European  scholarship  to-day. 

Has  he  died  without  issue?  —  at  least,  till  some  other 
man  of  the  like  exceptional  gifts  and  with  the  like  per- 
sistency of  application,  and  favored  by  others  equally  skilled 
in  the  discerning  of  spirits,  shall  work  his  toilsome  and  tardy 
way  to  the  like  elevation  of  scholarly  beneficence.  It  is  for 
us,  his  survivors,  his  friends  and  the  friends  of  sacred  learn- 
ing, alumni  of  the  school  which  he  served  and  adorned, 
graduates  and  friends  of  the  University  whose  honor  he  has 
done  so  much  to  augment  and  to  spread, —  it  is  for  us  to 
answer  the  question. 

When  we  consider  that  in  Cambridge  and  its  immediate 
vicinity  a  scholar  has  access  to  the  largest  store  of  books 
collected  in  any  single  locality  on  this  continent,  that  four 
of  the  University's  theological  endowments  antedate  the 
organization  of  the  Divinity  School,  that  it  was  an  express 
aim  of  the  founders  of  that  school  to  encourage  "  the  seri- 
ous, impartial,  unbiassed  investigation  of  Christian  truth," 
and  that  in  furtherance  of  this  avowed  aim  it  differs  from 
almost  all  other  theological  schools  in  exempting  not  its 
pupils  only,  but  its  professors  as  well,  from  a  required  assent 
to  the  distinctive  doctrines  or  practices  of  any  denomination 
of  Christians ;  and  to  that  extent  exempts  an  explorer  from 
everything  having  a  tendency  to  swerve  or  to  restrain  him 
unconsciously  in  his  endeavor  to  ascertain  the  facts,  and  all 
the  facts,  and  nothing  but  the  facts, —  when  we  consider 
these  things,  I  submit  that  the  privilege  of  the  hour  rises 
in  the  case  of  the  friends  and  patrons  of  theological  science 
here  to  the  dignity  of  an  obligation. 

But  you  are  ready  to  ask,  perhaps,  whether  I  do  not 
forget  that  the  clergy  are  an  impecunious  race.  I  reply,  in 


6o 

the  words  of  the  apostle,  "  All  things  are  yours."  A  clergy- 
man who  has  established  himself  in  the  confidence  of  his 
parishioners  as  a  man  of  learning,  good  sense,  piety,  and 
disinterested  benevolence,  finds  himself  in  command  of  pe- 
cuniary resources  for  every  good  enterprise,  the  extent  of 
which  will  often  surprise  him.  I  verily  believe,  brethren, 
you  have  but  to  speak,  and  the  thing  is  done. 

In  justice  to  others,  I  ought  frankly  to  add  that  this 
proposal  is  made  without  concert  or  conference.  If  any 
one,  accordingly,  think  it  to  be  unwise,  on  me  alone  let  the 
responsibility  fall.  But  I  earnestly  cherish  the  hope  that 
the  endowment  suggested  will  commend  itself  to  all  as  a 
needed  subsidy  to  theological  science,  and  especially  as  a 
monument,  alike  fitting  and  lasting,  in  honor  of  Ezra  Abbot. 


MEMORIAL    TRIBUTES. 


FROM    ACADEMICAL   AND    LITERARY    BODIES. 

AT  a  meeting  of  the  Faculty  of  the  Harvard  Divinity  School, 
held  May  2,  the  following  resolutions  were  adopted  :  — 

Whereas,  by  the  recent  death  of  Professor  Ezra  Abbot,  the  Faculty 
of  the  Divinity  School  has  been  deprived  of  a  most  beloved  and  hon- 
ored member,  we,  his  surviving  associates,  in  the  desire  to  place  on 
record  some  expression  of  our  sense  of  loss,  hereby  resolve, 

First,  That  in  him  the  School  has  lost  a  teacher  of  unsurpassed 
fidelity,  patience,  clearness,  and  benignity;  the  fraternity  of  Biblical 
scholars  has  had.  taken  from  it  one  who,  for  thoroughness,  accuracy, 
learning,  and  candor,  had  no  superior ;  and  all  who  knew  him  have  been 
bereaved  of  a  most  generous,  helpful,  self-sacrificing  friend. 

Second,  That  we  record  our  devout  and  grateful  acknowledgments 
to  the  Father  of  lights  for  our  departed  brother's  birth,  his  laborious, 
fruitful,  and  disinterested  life,  his  Christlike  gentleness,  humility,  and 
faith,  and  for  his  tranquil  and  believing  death. 

Third,  Lamenting  our  personal  loss,  the  loss  to  the  School  and 
rising  ministry,  the  loss  to  all  lovers  of  thorough  scholarship,  the  loss 
to  the  interests  of  Biblical  learning  throughout  Christendom,  we  offer 
our  special  sympathy  to  those  who  are  most  poignantly  bereaved  in 
his  death. 

The  following  communication  from  Rev.  A.  A.  Livermore,  Pres- 
ident of  the  Meadville  Theological  School,  was  addressed  to 
ProfessorC.  C.  Everett,  D.D.,  Dean  of  the  Faculty  of  the  Harvard 
Divinity  School :  — 

Professor  C.  C.  EVERETT,  D.D. :  — 

A  meeting  in  commemoration  of  your  beloved  associate,  the  late  Dr» 
Ezra  Abbot,  was  held  in  the  chapel  of  the  Theological  School  on  Tues- 
day last,  the  25th  inst. 

After  the  usual  introductory  exercises,  addresses  were  made  t>y 
A.  A.  Livermore  and  G.  L.  Gary,  Professors,  and  J.  Heddaeus,  S. 
Hamlet,  and  H.  T.  Lyche,  students,  on  the  life,  character,  and  labors 


62 

of  Dr.  Abbot,  and  the  invaluable  services  which  he  had  rendered  to 
sound  learning  and  Biblical  criticism  and  interpretation,  and  the  exem- 
plification of  a  pure  and  beautiful  Christian  spirit. 

At  the  close  of  the  exercises,  a  unanimous  vote  was  passed  that  the 
writer  should  communicate  to  the  family  of  the  deceased  and  the  Fac- 
ulty and  students  of  the  Cambridge  Divinity  School  the  expression  of 
the  sincere  sympathy  of  the  School  here  for  the  bereavement  which  they 
have  respectively  suffered,  and  the  great  loss  which  we  all  have  suffered, 
in  the  decease  of  one  of  our  greatest  scholars  and  best  men. 

A.  A.  LIVERMORE. 
MEADVILLE,  PA.,  March  29,  1884. 

At  a  meeting  of  the  American  New  Testament  Revision  Com- 
pany, held  at  the  Bible  House,  New  York,  Friday,  April  25,  1884, 
the  following  minute  was  unanimously  adopted :  — 

In  the  death  of  Professor  Abbot,  the  New  Testament  Revision 
Company  are  summoned  a  third  time,  since  the  completion  of  their 
work,  to  mourn  the  departure  of  one  of  their  number.  With  their  asso- 
ciates of  the  Old  Testament  Company,  they  would  reverently  bow  to 
the  divine  appointment,  and  thoughtfully  take  to  heart  its  admonitions. 

The  secluded  life  of  Dr.  Abbot,  and  his  singularly  modest  and 
retiring  disposition,  rendered  him  almost,  if  not  quite,  a  stranger  to 
every  one  of  us  till  we  entered  on  our  work  together  in  these  rooms. 
In  general  deliberations  respecting  matters  of  business,  and  particularly 
in  those  discussions,  alike  animated  and  delicate,  which  involved  our 
relations  to  the  English  Revisers  and  the  University  Presses,  his  voice 
was  heard  but  seldom.  Yet,  whenever  he  spoke,  his  characteristic  clear- 
ness of  apprehension,  his  accurate  and  complete  recollection  of  facts, 
his  judicial  impartiality  and  dispassionateness,  and,  above  all,  his  per- 
sonal willingness  to  become  anything  or  nothing,  if  so  be  the  Word  of 
God  in  its  purity  might  have  the  freer  course,  seldom  failed  to  become 
manifest. 

His  sphere  of  conspicuous  service,  however,  was  the  Revision  work. 
Always  one  of  the  first  in  his  place  at  the  table  and  one  of  the  last  to 
quit  it,  he  brought  with  him  thither  the  results  of  careful  preparation. 
His  suggestions  were  seldom  the  promptings  of  the  moment.  Hence, 
they  always  commanded  consideration,  often  secured  instant  adoption. 
Well  versed  in  the  resources  of  our  ancestral  tongue,  possessed  of  an  ear 
for  its  rhythm,  and  trained  to  a  nice  discrimination  in  his  use  of  it,  he 
rendered  appreciable  service  in  securing  for  the  new  translation  certain 
felicities  of  expression  to  which  its  critics,  amid  their  clamorous  censure 
of  its  defects,  have  hitherto  failed  to  render  due  recognition.  But  it  was 
in  questions  affecting  the  Greek  text  that  Dr.  Abbot's  exceptional  gifts 
and  attainments  were  pre-eminently  helpful.  Several  of  his  essays  on 


63 

debated  passages,  appended  to  the  printed  reports  of  our  proceedings 
which  were  forwarded  from  time  to  time  to  t]je  brethren  in  England,  are 
among  the  most  thorough  discussions  of  the  sort  which  are  extant,  won 
immediate  respect  for  American  scholarship  in  this  department,  and  had 
no  small  influence  in  determining  that  form  of  the  sacred  text  which  will 
ultimately,  we  believe,  find  acceptance  with  all  Christian  scholars. 

To  his  distinction  as  a  scholar,  Dr.  Abbot  added  rare  excellence  as 
a  Christian.  Such  chastened  sweetness  of  disposition,  such  disciplined 
^regard  for  the  sensibilities  of  his  associates,  such  studied  generosity  in 
debate,  such  patient  deference  when  overruled,  such  magnanimous  equa- 
nimity in  victory  as  were  habitual  with  him,  were  never  surpassed  among 
us.  Differing  from  the  rest  of  us  as  he  did  in  some  of  his  theological 
tenets,  his  Christlike  temper  rendered  him  a  brother  beloved,  and  lends 
a  heavenly  lustre  to  his  memory. 

We,  his  survivors,  desire  to  place  on  record  our  affectionate  tribute 
to  his  worth,  and  to  offer  to  his  bereaved  kindred  a  tender  expression 
of  our  sympathy. 

At  the  meeting  of  the  American  Oriental  Society,  held  May  7, 
1884,  the  following  minute  was  adopted,  and  ordered  to  be  spread 
on  the  record:  — 

The  American  Oriental  Society  desires  to  put  on  record  its  sense  of 
the  great  loss  sustained  by  the  world  of  scholars  and  by  this  Society  in 
the  death  of  Ezra  Abbot,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  Professor  of  the  Criticism  and 
Interpretation  of  the  New  Testament  in  the  Harvard  Divinity  School, 
for  more  than  thirty  years  the  faithful  Recording  Secretary  of  the 
Society,  who  has  won  for  himself,  as  a  student  of  the  textual  and  histor- 
ical criticism  of  the  New  Testament,  an  enviable  reputation  for  exact 
and  broad  scholarship,  and  has  made  contributions  of  enduring  value  to 
the  department  of  learning  to  which  he  was  devoted. 

C.  H.  TOY,  Recording  Secretary. 

At  a  special  meeting  of  the  Harvard  Biblical  Club,  held  in 
Boston,  May  10,  1884,  in  memory  of  their  late  associate,  Dr. 
Ezra  Abbot,  the  following  minute  was  adopted:  — 

By  the  death  of  Professor  Ezra  Abbot,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  the  Harvard 
Biblical  Club  has  been  deprived  of  one  of  its  original,  most  useful,  and 
most  valued  members. 

His  constancy  in  attendance  in  spite  of  accumulating  bodily  infirmi- 
ties, his  keen  and  broad  interest  in  everything  pertaining  to  the  Sacred 
Scriptures,  the  thoroughness  of  his  research,  the  extent  and  accuracy  of 
his  knowledge,  the  clearness  and  candor  of  his  discussions,  his  modest 


64 

estimate  of  himself,  and  his  generous  appreciation  of  the  efforts  of 
others,  render  his  name  for  us  the  synonyme  of  scholarly  and  Christian 
worth, —  an  associate  to  be  beloved,  a  scholarly  example  to  be  imitated, 
a  loss  to  be  deplored,  a  memory  to  be  reverently  cherished. 

GEORGE  H.  WHITTEMORE,  Secretary. 

At  a  meeting  of  the  Society  of  Biblical  Literature  and  Exegesis, 
the  following  minute  was  passed :  — 

The  Society  of  Biblical  Literature  and  Exegesis  desires  to  put  upon 
record  its  deep  sorrow  at  the  death  of  Ezra  Abbot,  one  of  the  founders 
of  the  Society,  constant  in  his  devotion  to  its  interests,  a  scholar  whose 
contributions  added  not  only  to  the  value  of  the  Society's  work,  but  also 
to  the  resources  of  New  Testament  study  throughout  the  world,  a  man 
whose  purity  and  nobleness  won  him  the  love  of  all  his  fellow-members. 

H.  G.  MITCHELL,  Secretary. 
The  above  minute  was  adopted  by  a  rising  vote. 

FROM    PERSONAL    SOURCES. 

The  circumstance  that  the  present  Memorial  will  find  its  chief 
circulation  among  the  personal  friends  of  Dr.  Abbot  will  secure 
indulgence,  it  is  hoped,  for  the  insertion  of  a  few  of  the  tributes 
to  him  uttered  in  correspondence.  Several  of  the  letters  which 
follow  were  written  in  acknowledgment  of  the  official  notifica- 
tion of  Professor  Abbot's  decease.  Extracts  from  others  are  but 
specimens  of  the  words  of  appreciation  and  sympathy  which  his 
death  called  forth, —  in  many  cases,  too  private  in  their  nature  to 
appear  in  print. 

[Professor  John  A.  Broadus,  D.D.,  Louisville,  Ky.~\ 

I  ask  permission  to  express  to  the  Faculty  of  the  Divinity  School  of 
Harvard  College  my  deep  sense  of  loss  in  the  death  of  Dr.  Ezra 
Abbot.  As  myself  a  student  and  teacher  in  matters  pertaining  to  the 
New  Testament,  I  have  long  recognized  that,  in  the  text-criticism  and 
in  the  literary  history  of  the  New  Testament,  he  was  facile  princeps 
among  American  scholars.  In  breadth  and  exactness  of  general  Biblical 
information,  he  had  few  equals  in  the  world.  His  patience  and  minute 
accuracy  in  research  commanded  universal  admiration.  His  readiness 
to  give  unstinted  help  to  the  literary  enterprises  of  others  was  some- 
thing rare  and  beautiful.  His  conscientiousness  in  investigation  and 
candor  in  stating  the  views  of  all  parties  showed  a  noble  Christian 


65 

character;  and  the  spirit  of  true  scholarship  is  seldom  so  completely 
exemplified.  In  a  single  interview  with  him  some  ten  years  ago  in  his 
study,  I  was  much  attracted  by  his  easily  pleasant  and  quietly  cordial 
ways. 

Alas !  we  could  ill  afford  to  lose  him.  May  the  aspiring  young 
scholars  of  our  country  be  stimulated  by  the  loss,  not  to  attempt  to  fill 
his  place,  but  to  find  and  fill  well  their  own  places  in  the  ranks  of 
Biblical  learning. 


[Thomas  Chase,  LL.D.,  President  of  Haverford  College,  Penn.~\ 

A  man  of  vast  stores  of  erudition  in  many  fields,  and  in  New 
Testament  criticism  without  a  peer  in  America  and  without  a  superior 
in  Europe,  he  was  a  modest  gentleman,  a  generous  friend,  and  a 
humble  and  devout  Christian.  The  whole  world  of  scholarship  feels 
a  common  loss  with  the  University  in  this  sad  and  great  bereavement. 

[Ex-Chancellor  Howard  Crosby,  D.D.,  New  York.} 

It  is  greatly  to  my  regret  that  my  duties  in  New  York  will  prevent 
my  attendance  at  the  funeral  of  Dr.  Ezra  Abbot.  His  exact  and 
extensive  scholarship  and  his  lovely  Christian  character  endeared  him 
to  us  all,  and  made  all  scholars  his  debtors.  In  many  years  of  close 
intercourse  with  Dr.  Abbot,  I  never  saw  him  other  than  the  most 
modest  of  men,  while  all  looked  up  to  him  as  ultimate  authority  in  the 
matter  of  Biblical  criticism  and  research. 

His  loss  is  a  national  one,  for  no  scholar  ever  shed  more  lustre  on 
the  American  name. 


[Professor  Timothy  D wight,  D.D.,  New  Haven.'] 

.  .  .  Those  who  knew  Dr.  Abbot,  whether  they  knew  him  little  or 
much,  for  a  longer  time  or  a  shorter,  have  but  one  remembrance  of 
his  honest,  earnest,  sincere,  manly,  beautiful  Christian  life.  They  all 
lovingly  tell  the  same  story ;  and  they  all  grieve  that  they  themselves 
have  lost  such  a  friend,  and  that  the  world  has  lost  out  of  its  life  such 
a  man. 


[Professor  A.  C.  Kendrick,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  Rochester,  7V.K] 

I  am  distressed  at  the  tidings  which  your  letter  conveys  to  me  of  the 
death  of  Professor  Abbot.  It  is  the  death  of  a  great  man  whom  we 
could  ill  afford  to  lose  from  the  ranks  of  our  American  and  the  world's 
Biblical  scholarship.  For  eight  years  I  sat  by  his  side  in  our  Revision 
meetings  nearly  every  month ;  and  I  never  found  him  wanting  in  learn. 


66 

ing,  candor,  modesty,  gentleness,  and  excellent  scholarly  and  practical 
judgment.  To  know  him  was  to  love  him,  and  to  name  him  was  to 
praise. 

{Professor  Howard  Osgood,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  Rochester,  N.  K] 

.  .  .  From  the  first  hour  of  my  meeting  Dr.  Abbot  in  the  college  yard 
some  fifteen  years  ago,  my  heart  has  gone  out  to  him ;  and  I  have  sat  at 
his  feet  to  learn  from  him  with  great  delight.  The  noblest  qualities  of 
manhood  —  strength,  firmness,  tenderness,  humility,  entire  self-forget- 
fulness  when  serving  others  was  concerned  —  were  in  him  joined  with 
the  noblest  qualities  and  attainments  of  the  scholar. 

He  has  been  and  will  be  a  lofty  model  for  the  scholars  of  America. 
Of  learning  that  was  simply  marvellous,  of  firm  opinions,  he  was,  above 
all  things,  fair  to  others,  the  soul  of  honesty,  and  utterly  devoid  of  the 
pride  of  scholarship. 

{Professor  M.  B.  Riddle,  D.D.,  Hartford,  Conn.} 

How  great  a  loss  this  death  is  to  your  University  and  to  American 
scholarship  the  public  will  soon  be  told,  though  few  will  fully  under- 
stand how  much  the  language  of  the  occasion  means. 

To  Professor  Abbot's  friends,  the  loss  seems  irreparable.  No  one 
was  ever  brought  into  close  relations  with  him  in  professional  studies 
without  learning  much  from  him;  but,  whatever  the  failure  to  profit 
by  his  immense  learning,  few  can  have  failed  to  love  him  for  his 
unselfishness,  his  warm  desire  to  promote  the  advance  of  others,  his 
sweetness  of  character  and  purity  of  motive.  It  is  a  great  grief  to 
lose  such  a  man  out  of  the  circle  of  one's  friends ;  but  it  remains  a 
privilege  to  have  had  him  for  a  friend  during  years  of  common  labor. 

{Ex-President  T.  D.  Woolsey,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  New  Haven,  Conn} 

.  .  .  My  acquaintance  with  him  during  our  Revision  work  gave  me 
profound  respect  for  him  as  a  man  as  well  as  a  scholar.  ...  He  was 
indeed  a  most  admirable  man,  and  one  whom  it  has  been  a  great  privi- 
lege to  know.  I  think  his  kindness  to  everybody  who  wanted  his  help 
was  unsurpassed  by  that  of  anybody  I  ever  met  with.  .  .  .  He  has  had 
my  full  confidence,  admiration,  and  respect  beyond  most  men  I  ever 
knew. 

{Dr.  Oskar  von  Gebhardt,  Gbttingen  (now  of  Berlin)} 

.  .  .  Der  Verlust,  den  die  biblische  Wissenschaft  durch  diesen 
Todesfall  erlitten  hat,  ist  ein  unersetzlicher.  Das  empfinden  mit  mir 
alle  welche  auf  diesem  Gebiete  arbeiten.  Die  personliche  Bekannt- 
schaft  des  verehrten  Mannes  war  mir  versagt ;  aber  durch  brieflichen 


67 

Verkehr  hatte  ich  auch  seine  personlichen  Eigenschaften  schatzen 
gelernt.  So  rufe  auch  ich  ihm  aus  bewegtem  Herzen  nach :  Have, 
pia  anima ! 

[Dr.  Caspar  Rent  Gregory,  Leipzig.'] 

...  In  thanking  you  for  the  sad  missive  announcing  the  death  of 
Professor  Ezra  Abbot,  I  shall  not  endeavor  to  swell  the  general  tribute 
to  his  unequalled  learning,  but  will  only  say  that  it  has  been  my  rare 
privilege  to  enjoy  the  benefit  of  his  self-sacrificing  devotion  of  that 
learning  to  further  the  work  of  others,  and  that  his  death  deprives  me 
of  a  constant  and  proven  guide,  counsellor,  and  support. 


[Professor  Dr.  Adolph  Harnack,  Giessen.~\ 

Indem  ich  fiir  die  giitige  Anzeige  des  schmerzlichen  Verlustes, 
welchen  die  Harvard  University  in  dem  Ableben  Ezra  Abbots  erlitten 
hat,  bestens  danke,  spreche  ich  zugleich  meine  herzliche  Theilnahme 
aus :  der  Name  Ezra  Abbots  wird  in  der  Geschichte  der  biblischen 
Wissenschaft  unverganglich  sein. 


[Professor  W.  Sanday,  D.D.,  Oxford.} 

I  must  write  a  few  words  to  thank  you  for  your  kindness  in  inform- 
ing me  of  the  death  of  Dr.  Ezra  Abbot,  and  to  add  one  more  to  the 
many  tributes  of  respect  and  sorrow  which  I  know  that  that  sad  event 
will  call  forth.  My  own  personal  debt  to  Dr.  Abbot  is  no  slight  one. 
I  owe  to  him  not  only  kind  and  encouraging  words  which  came  just 
at  a  time  when  such  words  are  most  valued;  but  I  have  also  on  my 
shelves  more  than  one  substantial  proof  of  his  generous  consideration 
for  younger  workers  in  the  same  field.  I  am  indebted  to  him  for 
making  me  better  acquainted  with  much  admirable  work  which  I  am 
afraid  might  otherwise  have  escaped  me.  But  the  best  gift  that  Dr. 
Abbot  could  leave  behind  was  that  of  his  own  example  and  character. 
These  were  deeply  impressed  on  all  he  wrote  both  in  private  and  public. 
A  more  complete  absence  of  all  that  was  insincere  and  meretricious 
I  do  not  think  it  has  ever  been  my  lot  to  meet  with,  or  a  more  single- 
minded  desire  for  truth  and  conscientious  endeavor  to  obtain  it.  For 
clearness,  accuracy,  and  precision  of  detail,  I  do  not  think  he  can  have 
had  a  rival  on  either  side  of  the  Atlantic ;  but  it  was  evident  that  they 
were  qualities  which  were  moral  as  much  as  intellectual.  My  sense  of 
his  loss  is  compounded  of  gratitude  and  admiration,  and  of  the  deepest 
regret  that  such  a  career  should  be  closed. 


68 

{Professor  B.  F.  Westcott,  D.D.,  Cambridge.} 

The  news  of  Dr.  Ezra  Abbot's  death  reached  me  at  Edinburgh,  and 
added  an  element  of  sadness  to  a  commemoration  which  was  full  of  the 
highest  hope  and  faith.  .  .  . 

It  is  the  simple  truth  to  say  that  (as  far  as  I  know)  no  scholar  in 
America  was  superior  to  him  in  exactness  of  knowledge,  breadth  of 
reading,  perfection  of  candor,  and  devotion  to  truthfulness  of  judgment. 
All  that  is  said  in  the  two  most  interesting  papers  in  the  Christian 
Register  of  his  self-sacrifice  is  justified  by  my  own  experience.  No  eye 
was  keener  than  his,  and  no  one  could  be  more  ready  to  place  all  his 
powers  at  the  service  of  others  with  spontaneous  generosity.  Such 
men  effect  far  more  than  they  know,  and  far  tnore  than  their  friends 
know.  They  keep  the  tradition  of  scholarly  unselfishness  fresh  and 
vigorous.  They  help  us  to  know  a  little  better  the  force  of  the  great 
life  by  which  we  are  sustained.  They  teach  us  to  take  to  ourselves  the 
most  cheering  of  promises,  and  to  '  win  our  souls  in  patience.' 

Of  the  extended  tributes  paid  to  Dr.  Abbot  in  the  public 
journals,  the  chief,  it  is  believed,  will  be  found  in  :  — 

The  Daily  Advertiser  of  March  22. 
The  Christian  Register  of  March  27  and  April  3. 
The  Independent  of  March  27,  April  3,  and  April  10. 
The  Nation  of  March  27. 

The  Literary   World,  Harper's   Weekly,  the   Library  Journal,  and 
the  Christian  Intelligencer  of  April  5. 
Unity  (Chicago)  of  April  16. 
The  Unitarian  Review  and  the  Andover  Review  for  May. 


LIST  OF  HIS  PUBLICATIONS. 

1848.  Use  of  the  word  "  Deus  "  in  Plautus  and  Terence,  Christian 
Examiner  for  November,  pp.  389-406. 

1852.  Notice  of  Tischendorf's  Greek  Testament  (Editio  Lipsiensis 

Secunda,  1849)  in  the  Bibliotheca  Sacra  (Andover,  Mass.) 
for  July,  pp.  623-628. 

1853.  A  Classed  Catalogue  of  the  Library  of  the  Cambridge  High 

School,  etc.     pp.  xvi,  239.     Cambridge  :  John  Bartlett. 

1854.  Note  to  an  article  in  the   Christian  Examiner  for  July,  dis- 

cussing a  passage  in  Justin  Martyr's  Dial,  with  Trypho, 
ch.  1 06. 

1855.  He  edited  with   notes  or  appendixes  A  Translation  of  the 

Gospels  with  Notes,  by  Andrews  Norton.  2  vols.  Bos- 
ton :  Little,  Brown  &  Co. 

1856.  Edited  with  notes  or  appendixes  (especially   pp.    432-82) 

A  Statement  of  Reasons  for  not  believing  the  Doctrines  of 
Trinitarians,  etc.,  by  Andrews  Norton.  Second  Edition. 
Boston  :  American  Unitarian  Association. 

Three  articles  on  "The  Blood  of  God,"  Acts  x.,  28  (in 
opposition  to  the  Rev.  S.  W.  S.  Button),  in  the  Christian 
Register  for  March  22,  April  19,  April  26. 

Article  on  "God  was  manifest  in  the  flesh,"  I.  Tim.  iii.,  16, 
Christian  Register  for  March  29. 

1857.  Articles  on  MacWhorter's  Yahveh  Christ,  in  the  Christian 

Register  for  February  14  and  March  21. 

1858.  Strictures  on  Philip  Buttmann's  Greek  Testament  (Teubner, 

1856),  in  the  Bibliotheca  Sacra  for  October,  pp.  877-882. 

Three  articles   on   (the   Doxology  in)   Rom.  ix.,  5,   in  the 

Independent  for  October   14,  October  28,  November    18. 

1859.  Article  on  "  The  Doxology  in  the   Lord's   Prayer,"   in   the 

Daily  Advertiser  for  March  29. 
Article    on    "  Dr.    Holmes    and    the   Independent,"   in    the 

Christian  Register  for  June  18. 
Notice  of  Alford's  Greek  Testament,  Vol.   I.  (New  York, 


Harper  &  Brothers),  in  the  Christian  Examiner  for  July, 
pp.  142,  143. 

1860.  Communications  to  the  Christian  Register  f rom  January  21 

to  March  3,  respecting  Dr.  Huntington's  discussion  of 
the  Doctrine  of  the  Trinity.  Republished  as  a  part  of 
the  volume  entitled  The  New  Discussion  of  the  Trinity. 
Boston,  1867. 

Notice  of  Lamson's  Church  of  the  First  Three  Centuries,  in 
the  Christian  Examiner  for  July,  pp.  465-471. 

Revised  and  enlarged  the  "  Pronouncing  Tables  of  Greek 
and  Latin  Proper  Names"  and  of  "Scripture  Proper 
.  Names  "  for  Worcester's  large  Dictionary  of  the  Eng- 
lish Language. 

1861.  "A  Glimpse  of  Glory  "  (extracts  from  Meditations,  etc.,  by 

Andrew  Welwood).  An  article  in  the  Christian  Register 
for  July  27. 

Article  on  the  reading  "only  begotten  God,"  in  John  i., 
T 8,  with  particular  reference  to  the  statements  of  Dr. 
Tregelles,  Bibliotheca  Sacra  for  October,  pp.  840-872. 

1863.  "  Statement  respecting  the  New  Catalogues  of  the  College 

Library,"  addressed  to  the  "  Gentlemen  of  the  Commit- 
tee [appointed  by  the  Board  of  Overseers]  for  the  Exami- 
nation of  the  Library,"  and  privately  printed  July  10. 

1864.  "Literature  of  the  Doctrine  of  a  Future  Life,"  etc.  (pp.  xii, 

224),  appended  to  Alger's  Critical  History,  etc.  New 
York :  W.  J.  Widdleton. 

Jeremy  Taylor's  Holy  Living,  a  revised  and  corrected 
edition  on  the  basis  of  Pickering's,  the  quotations  veri- 
fied, references  filled  out,  etc.  Little,  Brown  &  Co. 

Jeremy  Taylor's  Holy  Dying  (edited  in  the  same  manner 
as  the  above).  Little,  Brown  &  Co. 

Contributed  (from  p.  572,  line  10  from  bottom,  to  p.  574, 
2d  paragraph)  to  Dr.  F.  H.  Hedge's  Review  of  Shedd's 
History  of  Christian  Doctrine  in  the  North  American  Re- 
view for  April,  p.  567  sqq. 

1865.  Notes  to  the  Revised  and  Enlarged  Edition  of  Lamson's 

Church  of  the  First  Three  Centuries.  Boston  :  Reissued 
with  additional  notes  by  Henry  lerson.  London,  1875. 

1866.  Edited  with  notes  and  an  appendix  a  new  edition  of  Orme's 

Memoir  of  the  Controversy  respecting  the  Three  Heavenly 
Witnesses,  I.  John  v.,  7.  New  York :  James  Miller. 


1867-70.  Co-operated  with  Prof.  H.  B.  Hackett  in  preparing  the 
American  edition  (Hurd  &  Houghton)  of  Smith's  Dic- 
tionary of  the  Bible.  4  vols. 

1868.  Notice   of  Prof.    C.    E.  Stowe's  Origin  and  History  of  the 

Books  of  the  Bible,  in  the  North  American  Review  for 
July,  pp.  307-314. 

1869.  Assisted  in  editing  and   printing   Dr.  George  R.  Noyes's 

(posthumous)  Translation  of  the  New  Testament  from  the 
Greek  Text  of  Tischendorf.  Boston  :  American  Unitarian 
Association. 

1870.  Assisted  in  the  preparation  of  Charles  F.  Hudson's  Greek 

and  English  Concordance  of  the  New  Testament,  and  added 
an  appendix  and  supplement  (containing  a  collation  of 
Tischendorf's  eighth  edition).  Assisted  also  in  editing 
and  perfecting  the  subsequent  editions  down  to  that  of 
1882. 

1872.  Examination  of  the  distinction  between  a\rtu  and  cpwrdw  as 
given  by  Trench  in  his  Synonyms  of  the  New  Testament, 
North  American  Review  for  January,  pp.  171-189. 
"  On  the  Comparative  Antiquity  of  the  Sinaitic  and  Vatican 
Manuscripts  of  the  Greek  Bible  "  (in  opposition  to  the 
view  of  Rev.  J.  W.  Burgon),  Journ.  of  Amer.  Orient. 
Soc.,  Vol.  X.,  pp.  189-200.  Cf.  p.  602. 

1875.  "The  Late  Professor  Tischendorf,"  an  article  in  the  Unita- 

rian Review,  etc.,  for  March,  pp.  217-236. 
On  the  reading  "  an  only  begotten    God,"  or  "  God  only 
begotten,"  John  i.,   18.     Article    (first   privately  printed 
for   the   American    Bible   Revision    Committee)    in   the 
Unitarian  Review,  etc.,  for  June,  pp.  560-571. 
"  The  Late  Dr.  Tregelles,"  an  article  in  the  New  York  In- 
dependentfor  July  i,  1875.  (Reprinted  at  Plymouth,  Eng.) 

1876.  On  the   reading  "Church  of  God,"  Acts  xx.,  28.     Article 

(first  privately  printed  for  the  American  Bible  Revision 
Committee)  in  the  Bibliotheca  Sacra  for  April,  pp.  313-52. 

1877.  Article  on  the  American  Oriental   Society    (reviewing  the 

controversy  between  Messrs.  Whitney  and  Miiller)  in  the 
Bibliotheca  Sacra  for  July,  pp.  557-562. 
Privately  pprinted  (for  the  American  Bible  Revision  Com- 
mittee) note  on  John  viii.,  44. 

1878.  Article   on    "Ancient   Papyrus   and  the   Mode  of  Making 

Paper  from  It,"  in  the  Library  Journal  for   November 


72 

(exposing  the  current  errors  respecting  the  nature  of 
the  plant  and  the  preparation  of  writing  material  from  it). 

1878.  Article  "Septuagint"   in  Johnson's  Universal    Cyclopedia, 

etc.,  Vol.  IV.,  pp.  181,  182. 

Article  on  "  The  New  Testament  Text :  The  Imperfection 
of  the  Greek  Text  of  the  New  Testament  from  which 
our  Common  English  Version  was  made  and  our  Present 
Resources  for  its  Correction,"  Sunday  School  World 
(Phil.)  for  October.  Republished  in  Anglo-American 
Bible  Revision,  New  York,  1879.  PP-  86-98. 

Reply  to  Rev.  Dr.  John  A.  Todd's  strictures  on  the  Greek 
Text  of  the  New  Revision.  Article  in  the  Christian  Intel- 
ligencer for  November  2 1 . 

1879.  "Reply   to   the   Letter   of  Dr.    [John    A.]     Todd."      Two 

articles  in  the  Christian  Intelligencer  for  April  17  and 
April  24. 

"  I.  John  v.,  7,  and  Luther's  German  Bible."  Article  in  the 
Christian  Intelligencer  for  May  15. 

1880.  "The    Authorship   of   the   Fourth   Gospel:    External    Evi- 

dences."    Boston :  Geo.  H.  Ellis,     pp.  104. 

1881.  "The   Gospels  in  the   New  Revision."     Three  articles  in 

the  (Phil.)  Sunday  School  Times  for  May  28,  June  4,  June 
ii.  That  of  May  28  was  reprinted  in  Dr.  Kennedy's  Ely 
Lectures  on  the  Revision.  Appendix  ii.  (London,  1882.) 

Notice  of  Westcott  and  Hort's  edition  of  the  Greek  Testa- 
ment in  the  Sunday  School  Times,  November  5.  Re- 
printed in  large  part  in  the  Ely  Lectures  (as  above),  pp. 
161-165. 

Article  on  Dr.  Gregory's  Prolegomena  to  Tischendorf's 
last  critical  edition  of  the  Greek  Testament,  in  the  Final 
Issue  (April-July)  of  the  Harvard  Register,  pp.  322,  323. 

1882.  "  On  the  Construction  of  Titus   ii.,  13,"  in  the  Journal  of 

the  Society  of  Biblical  Lit.  and  Exegesis  for  June  and 
December,  pp.  3-19.  Also  "  On  the  Construction  of 
Romans  ix.,  5,"  ibid.,  pp.  88-154.  (Cf.  Journal,  etc., 
for  June  and  December,  1882.  p.  160  et  seq.) 
Article  "Bible  Text:  The  New  Testament"  (by  Tischen- 
dorf  and  Gebhardt)  in  the  Schaff-Herzog  Cyclopaedia, 
revised  and  supplemented. 

1883.  "A  New  Authority  on  Demonology."     Article  in  the  Inde- 

pendent ivi  March  i. 


73 

1883.  "An  Exegetical  Note  "  (on  Matt,  xxii.,   14).     In  the  Chris. 

tian  Register  im  February  22. 

1884.  "  Recent  Discussions   of  Romans  ix.,  5,"  in  Journal  of  the 

Soc.  of  Biblical  Lit.  and  Exegesis  for  June  and  December, 
1883*     pp.  90-112. 

"Prolegomena,  Pars  prior,"  to  the  eighth  larger  edition 
of  Tischendorf's  Greek  Testament,  his  name  being  asso- 
ciated with  that  of  the  author,  Dr.  C.  R.  Gregory,  upon 
the  title-page. 

1884.  (Posthumous)  Extract  from  a  private  letter  to  Dr.  Isaac  H. 
Hall :  Gerhard  von  Mastricht  (not  van  Maestrichf)  the 
proper  spelling  of  the  name  of  the  Greek  Testament 
editor  designated  by  the  letters  "  G.  D.  T.  M.  D."  In 
the  Unitarian  Review  for  August,  pp.  169-173. 

His  aid  in  the  preparation  of  many  other  publications  is 
acknowledged  by  their  authors.  Among  them  may  be  mentioned  : 

Barrows,  S.  J.,  The  Doom  of  the  Majority.     Boston,  1883. 

Bissell,  Dr.  E.  C.,  The  Apocrypha,  etc.  (in  Lange). 

Gary,  Prof.  Geo.  L.,  Introduction  to  the  Greek  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment. Andover,  1878. 

Huidekoper,  F.,  Judaism  at  Rome.     New  York,  1877. 

Huidekoper,  F.,  Indirect  Testimony  to  the  Genuineness  of  the 
Gospels.  New  York,  1879. 

Mitchell,  Dr.  Edward  C.,  Critical  Handbook,  etc.  London  Relig- 
ious Tract  Society  (also  Andover,  Mass.). 

Schaff,  Dr.  Ph.,  History  of  the  Christian  Church.  Revised  Edi- 
tion. Vol.  I.,  1882. 

Schaff,  Dr.  Ph.,  Companion  to  the  Greek  Testament,  and  the  Eng- 
lish Version,  1883. 

Schodde,  George  H.,  The  Book  of  Enoch,  etc.,  1882. 


The  following  titles  were  discovered  too  late  to  be  inserted  in 
their  proper  place  in  the  preceding  list :  — 

1874.  A  Report  on  the  Bucknell  Library,  Crozer  Theological 
Seminary.  Philadelphia :  James  B.  Rodgers  &  Co. 

1877.  A  Review  of  Smith  &  Wace's  Dictionary  of  Christian  Biog- 
raphy, etc.,  Vol.  I.,  in  the  Nation  for  Dec.  27,  p.  399,  sq. 


OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY   ) 

OF  / 

4^Urofti*i£i 


CORRECTION. 

FROM  more  exact  information,  received  since  the  preceding  pages 
were  printed,  it  appears  that  the  statement  (on  page  43)  respecting 
Professor  Abbot's  invitation  to  take  charge  of  the  Prolegomena  goes 
too  far.  He  was,  at  one  stage,  the  choice  of  certain  of  the  executors, 
and  (although  he  never  received  the  formal  invitation)  was  approached 
upon  the  subject ;  but,  even  had  he  not  instantly  declined,  his  distance 
from  the  press  would  have  been  regarded  as  fatal  to  the  arrangement. 
(See  the  Bibliotheca  Sacra  for  January,  1876,  p.  181.)  J.  H.  T. 


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